L     I     B     R          S 


Evelyn  H.  Sherman 


'     LIBRARY 

UNIVERSITY  OF 
CALIFORNIA 

SAN  DJEGO 


THE  UNIVERSITY  LIBRARY       *f  3       — 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA,  SAN  DIEGO 
LA  JOLLA,  CALIFORNIA 


THE  GRKAT  WORKS 


OF 


THOMAS  PAINE. 


COMPLETE. 


POLITICAL  AND    THEOLOGICAL. 


D.  M.   BENNETT: 
LIBERAL  AND  SCIENTIFIC   PUBLISHING   HOUS1. 

141  EIGHTH  STREET.  NEW  YOBK. 


CONTENTS 

LIFE  OF  PAINE, 

COMMON  SENSE, 

THE  CRISIS, 

THE  BIGHTS  OF  MAN, 

THE  AGE  OF  REASON, 

EXAMINATION  OF  THE  PBOPHEOTEB, 

BEPLY  TO  THE  BISHOP  OF  LLANDAIF 

LETTER  TO  MR.  ERSKINE, 

AN  ESSAY  ON  DREAMS, 

LETTER  TO  CAMILLE  JORDAN, 

THE  BELIGION  OF  DEISM, 

LETTER  TO  SAMUEL  ADAMS 


INTRODUCTION, 


A  full  and  impartial  history  of  THOMAS  PAINE  alone  can  supply 
that,  the  omission  of  which  falsifies  every  work  pretending  to  give 
an  account  of  the  war  for  the  national  independence  of  the  United 
States. 

The  American  Revolution  of  1776,  of  which  THOMAS  PAINE 
was  the  author-hero,  was  the  prelude  to  that  far  more  sanguinary 
struggle  against  oppression  and  wrong  which  overturned,  or  irre- 
parably shook,  every  throne  in  Western  Europe  ;  including,  in  the 
category,  even  the  chair  of  St.  Peter  ;  and  of  which  struggle  the 
most  prominent  author-hero  was  JEAN  JACQUES  ROUSSEAU. 

This  is  generally  understood.  But  a  truth  incalculably  more 
important  has  hitherto  been  either  wholly  overlooked,  or  but  glim- 
meringly  perceived  ;  it  is  this  :  —  Both  the  American  and  French 
Revolutions  were  but  prominent  incidents,  or  crisis-stages,  in  the 
irrepressible  struggle  for  human  rights  which  commenced  when  na- 
ture implanted  in  her  highest  organism,  man,  that  instinct  which 
points  to  the  goal  of  development ;  that  unconquerable  desire  for 
perfect  and  sufficiently-lasting  or  "eternal"  happiness,  which  indi- 
cates the  common  aim  and  attainable  end  of  science,  of  art,  and  of 
all  natural,  materialistic,  or  intelligible  activities  :  —  that  thirst  for 
liberty  which  can  be  satisfied  by  nothing  short  of  the  revolution 
which  will  remove  all  constraint — which  will  accomplish  revelation 
— and  thus  justify  LUTHER,  ROUSSEAU,  PAINE,  FOURIER,  and  all  other 
revolutionists.  Of  this  crowning  revolution,  the  text-book  is  "  The 
Positive  Philosophy "  of  AUGUSTE  COMTE. 

Had  Thomas  Paine  beeli  seconded  as  valiantly  when  he  made 
priestcraft  howl,  as  he  was  when  he  hurled  defiance  against  kings, 
despotism  by  this  time  would  really,  instead  of  only  nominally,  have 
lain  as  low  as  did  its  minions  at  Trenton  and  Yorktown.  The  land 
over  which  the  star-spangled  banner  waves  would  not  have  become 
the  prey  of  corrupt,  spoil-seeking  demagogues,  nor  would  Europa 
now  tremble  at  the  nod  of  a  military  dictator. 

Not  but  that  priestcraft  itself  has  a  substructure,  all  but  "supei 
naturally"  profound,  which  must  be  sapped  before  justice  can  be 
more  than  a  mockery,  freedom  aught  but  a  mere  abstraction,  or  hap- 
piness little  else  than  an  ignis  fatuus.  But  man  should  have  con- 
tinued the  great  battle  for  his  rights  when  the  soldiers  and  author- 
heroes  of  liberty  were  in  the  full  flush  of  victory  ;  instead  of  making 
that  vain,  mischievous  and  ridiculous  (except  as  provisional)  com 
promise  with  the  human  inclinations.called  duty  ;  and  falling  bach, 
on  that  miserable  armistice  between  the  wretched  poor  and  the  un- 


4  INTBODUCTION. 

happy  rich,  for  the  conditions  of  which,  consult  that  refinement  of 
treachery,  misnamed  a  constitution,  ^and  that  opaque  entanglement, 
absurdly  entitled  law.  Can  right  be  done  and  peace  be  maintained, 
under  institutions  whose  ultimatum  is  to  give  half  a  breakfast  to  the 
million,  and  half  a  million  or  so  to  the  'balance  of  mankind,  condi- 
tioned on  such  anxiety  on  the  part  of  the  latter,  lest  they  be  added 
to  the  million  before  dinner-time,  that  dyspepsia,  rather  than  nu- 
trition, "waits  on  appetite  ?"  Is  man  irremediably  doomed  to  a  con- 
dition which,  at  shorter  and  shorter  intervals,  forces  him  to  seek  re- 
lief in  one  of  those  saturnalias  of  carnage  and  devastation  which 
throws  progress  aback,  menaces  civilization  even,  and  yet  but  par- 
tially and  temporarily  mitigates  human  ills  ?  Is  this  the  whole  sum, 
substance  and  end  of  revolution  ?  It  appears  to  me,  that  they  who 
believe  this,  and  who  admire  and  commend  Thomas  Paine  from 
their  stand-point,  dishonour  his  memory  far  more  than  his  professed 
enemies  do  or  can. 

But  to  enable  all  to  understandingly  form  their  own  conclusions, 
I  shall  give  all  the  essential  facts  with  respect  to  the  history  before 
us,  with  which  a  long  and  careful  search,  under  most  favourable 
circumstances,  has  made  me  acquainted.  For,  let  facts  be  fairly 
stated,  and  truth  be  fully  known,  is  the  correlate  of  the  proposition 
(the  correctness  of  which  I  demonstrated  in  a  former  work  "The 
Religion  of  Science")  that  nature,  simple,  scientific  and  artistic, 
will  prove  all-sufficient ;  and  neither  needs,  nor  admits  the  possibility 
of,  a  superior:  that  man,  therefore,  requires  nothing  more  than  what 
nature  is  capable  of  being  developed  into  producing  ;  nor  can  he 
know  aught  beyond  nature,  or  form  what  can  intelligibly  be  called 
an  idea  of  any  happiness  or  good,  superior  to  that  which,  by  means 
of  the  substantial,  including  of  course,  man  himself,  can  be  procured. 

There  needs  but  to  have  the  light  of  truth  shine  fully  upon  the 
real  character  of  Thomas  Paine,  to  prove  him  to  have  been  a  far 
greater  man  than  his  most  ardent  admirers  have  hitherto  given  him 
credit  for  being.  Paine's  history  is  so  intimately  connected  with  that 
of  progress  both  before  and  since  his  time,  that  it  will  necessarily 
embrace  a  very  wide  range  of  liberal  information. 

I  am  not  unmindful  that  there  have  been  hundreds,  perhaps 
thousands  of  author-heroes  and  heroines.  Bacon,  Locke,  Luther, 
Voltaire,*  Fourier  and  Robert  Owen  were  prominently  of  the  former, 
and  Mary  Wollstonecraft  and  Frances  Wright  were  decidedly 
among  the  latter.  But  it  appears  to  me,  that  none  of  their  writings 
have  been  quite  such  text-books  of  revolution,  as  those  of  Rousseau 
and  Paine  were,  and  those  of  Comte  now  are. 

*  Schlosser,  in  his  "History  of  the  Eighteenth  Century,"  whilst  speaking 
of  Voltaire,  Shaftesbury,  and  "the  numerous  deists  who  were  reproachfully 
called  atheists,"  says,  that  they  "wielded  the  weapons"  which  Locke  "had 
forged." 


LIFE 


OP 


THOMAS   PAINE. 


PERIOD  FIRST. 
1737—1774. 


FROM  MR.  PAINE'S  BIRTH,  TO  HIS  ARRIVAL  IN  AMERICA. 

THOMAS  PAINE  was  born  in  Thetford,  Norfolk  county, 
England,  on  the  29th  of  January,  1737. 

His  father  was  a  member  of  the  society  of  Friends,  and  a 
staymaker  by  trade  ;  his  mother  professed  the  faith  of  the 
church  of  England. 

At  the  age  of  about  thirteen  years,  he  left  the  common 
school,  in  which,  in  addition  to  the  branches  of  education 
usually  taught  therein,  he  had  learned  the  rudiments  of  Latin, 
and  went  to  work  with  his  father.  But  his  school  teacher, 
who  had  been  chaplain  on  board  a  man-of-war,  had  infused 
into  his  young  and  ardent  mind  such  an  enthusiasm  for  the 
naval  service,  that  after  reluctantly  toiling  about  three  years 
at  his  not  very  lucrative  or  promising  calling,  he  left  home, 
evidently  resolved  to  "  seek  the  bubble  reputation  even  in  the 
cannon's  mouth,"  and  to  pursue  his  fortune  through  such 
chances  as  the  war  then  imminent  between  his  country  and 
France,  might  offer. 

Dreadful  must  have  been  the  conflict  between  his  com- 
passionate nature  and  his  necessities  and  ambition.  Arrived 
m  London,  without  friends  or  money,  he,  nevertheless,  strove 
by  every  means  in  his  power  to  settle  himself  honorably  in 
the  world,  without  embracing  the  dreadful  profession  he  had 
been  both  constituted  and  educated  to  look:  upon  with  hor- 
ror :  he  even  hesitated  so  far  as  to  return  to  his  old  occupa- 
tion- 


D  LIFE   OF   THOMAS   PAINE. 

After  working  a  few  weeks  for  Mr.  Morris,  in  Hanover- 
street,  Long  Acre,  he  went  to  Dover,  where  he  also  worked 
a  short  time  for  a  Mr  Grace. 

War  between  England  and  France  had  now  been  de 
clared  ;  our  hero  was  in  all  the  buoyancy  of  youth,  being  not 
yet  seventeen  years  old  ;  fortune  and  glory  were  possible  on 
the  one  hand,  poverty  and  toil  inevitable  on  the  other. 

War  is  murder,  'tis  true ;  murder,  all  the  more  heinous  for 
being  gloried  in  ;  murder,  all  the  more  abominable  for  the  mag- 
nificence of  the  scale  on  which  it  is  perpetrated  ;  murder,  which 
touches  the  lowest  depths  of  cowardice,  in  being  carried  on 
by  vast  armies  and  immense  fleets,  instead  of  by  smaller  and 
bolder  gangs  of  pirates,  and  by  more  venturesome  banditti. 
But  its  infernal  craft  would  sail,  and  its  death-dealing  can- 
non be  manned,  equally  with  or  without  him  ;  and  the  place 
which  he  refused  would  be  taken,  probably  by  some  one  with 
far  less  tenderness  for  a  wounded  or  surrendered  foe. 

On  board  the  privateer  "  Terrible,"  Captain  Death,  en- 
listed, probably  in  the  capacity  of  a  sailor  or  marine,  the 
man  who  was  afterwards  the  soul  of  a  revolution  which  ex-' 
tended  elective  government  over  the  most  fertile  portion  of 
the  globe,  including  an  area  more  than  twenty  times  larger 
than  that  of  Great  Britain,  and  who  had  the  unprecedented 
honor  to  be  called,  though  a  foreigner,  to  the  legislative 
councils  of  the  foremost  nation  in  the  world. 

For  some  unexplained  cause,  Paine  left  the  "  Terrible  " 
almost  immediately,  and  shipped  on  board  the  "  King  of 
Prussia."  But  the  affectionate  remonstrances  of  his  father 
soon  induced  him  to  quit  privateering  altogether. 

In  the  year  1759,  he  settled  at  Sandwich,  as  a  master 
staymaker.  There  he  became  acquainted  with  a  young 
woman  of  considerable  personal  attractions,  whose  name  was 
Mary  Lambert,  to  whom  he  was  married  about  the  end  of  the 
same  year. 

His  success  in  business  not  answering  his  expectations, 
he,  in  the  year  1760,  removed  to  Margate.  Here  his  wife 
died. 

From  Margate  he  went  to  London  ;  thence  back  again 
to  his  native  town  ;  where,  through  the  influence  of  Mr.  Cock- 
sedge,  the  recorder,  he,  towards  the  end  of  1763,  obtained  a 
situation  in  the  excise. 

Under  the  pretext  of  some  trifling  fault,  but  really,  as 
there  is  every  reason  for  supposing,  because  he  was  too  con- 
scientious to  connive  at  the  villainies  which  were  practiced 


PERIOD    FIRST.  7 

by  both  his  superiors  and  his  compeers  in  office,  he  was 
dismissed  from  his  situation  in  little  more  than  a  year.  It 
has  never  been  publicly  stated  for  what  it  was  pretended 
that  he  was  dismissed  ;  and  the  fact  that  he  was  recalled  in 
eleven  months  thereafter,  shows  that  whatever  the  charge 
against  him  was,  it  was  not  substantiated,  nor  probably,  a 
very  grave  one.  That  the  British  government,  in  its  subse- 
quent efforts  to  destroy  his  character,  never  made  any  handle 
of  this  affair,  is  conclusive  in  his  favor. 

During  his  suspension  from  the  excise,  he  repaired  to 
London,  where  he  became  a  teacher  in  an  academy  kept  by 
Mr.  Noble  of  Goodman's  Fields ;  and  during  his  leisure  hours 
he  applied  himself  to  the  study  of  astronomy  and  natural  phi- 
losophy. He  availed  himself  of  the  advantages  which  the 
philosophical  lectures  of  Martin  and  Ferguson  afforded,  and 
made  the  acquaintance  of  Dr.  Bevis,  an  able  astronomer  of 
the  Royal  Society. 

On  his  re-appointment  to  the  excise,  Paine  returned  to 
Thetford,  where  he  continued  till  the  Spring  of  1768,  when 
the  duties  of  his  office  called  him  to  Lewes,  in  Sussex.  There 
he  boarded  in  the  family  of  Mr  Ollive,  tobacconist ;  but  at 
the  end  of  about  twelve  months,  the  latter  died.  Paine  suc- 
ceeded him  in  business,  and  in  the  year  1771,  married  his 
daughter. 

In  1772,  he  wrote  a  small  pamphlet  entitled  "  The  Case 
of  the  Excise  Officers."  Although  this  was  specially  intended 
to  cover  the  case  of  a  very  ill  paid  class  of  government 
officers,  it  was  a  remarkably  clear  and  concise  showing  that 
the  only  way  to  make  people  honest,  is  to  relieve  them 
from  the  necessity  of  being  otherwise. 

This  pamphlet  excited  both  the  alarm  and  hatred  of  his 
superiors  in  office,  who  were  living  in  luxury  and  ease,  and 
who,  besides  getting  nearly  all  the  pay  for  doing  hardly  any 
of  the  work,  were  becoming  rich  by  smuggling,  which  their 
positions  enabled  them  to  carry  on  almost  with  impunity. 
They  spared  no  pains  to  pick  some  flaw  in  the  character  or 
conduct  of  the  author  of  their  uneasiness,  but  could  find 
nothing  of  which  to  accuse  him,  except  that  he  kept  a  tobacco- 
nist's shop ;  this  however,  under  the  circumstances,  was  suffi- 
cient, and  the  most  honest,  if  not  the  only  conscientious  ex- 
ciseman in  all  England,  was  finally  dismissed,  in  April, 
1774. 

Paine  associated  with,  and  was  highly  respected  by  the 
best  society  in  Lowes,  although  so  poor,  that  in  a  month  after 


8  LIFE   OF   THOMAS  PAINE. 

his  dismissal  from  office,  his  goods  had  to  be  sold  to  pay  hia 
debts ;  a  very  strong  proof  that  he  had  never  abused  his  offi- 
cial trust. 

I  have  twice  already  so  far  violated  my  own  taste,  to 
please  that  of  others,  as  to  mention  that  the  subject  of  these 
memoirs  had  been  married.  But  I  cannot  consent  to  meddle 
further  with,  and  assist  the  public  to  peer  into  affairs  with 
which  none  but  the  parties  immediately  concerned  have  any 
business,  except  under  protest.  Therefore,  I  do  now  most 
solemnly  protest,  that  I  feel  more  guilty,  more  ashamed,  and 
more  as  though  I  ought  to  have  my  nose  rung,  for  writing 
any  thing  at  all  about  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Paine's  sexual  affairs, 
than  I  should,  were  I  to  enter  into  a  serious  inquiry  respect- 
ing the  manner  in  which  they  performed  any  of  their  natural 
functions.  Still,  reader,  you  may  be  sure  of  my  fidelity  ;  you 
need  not  suspect  that  I'm  going  to  suppress  any  of  the  facts, 
for  if  I  undertake  to  do  a  thing,  I'll  carry  it  through,  if  it's 
ever  so  mean. 

To  begin,  then  : — 

In  the  flowery  month  of  May,  exactly  one  thousand  seven 
hundred  and  seventy-four  years  after  Jehovah  had  been  pre- 
sented with  a  son  by  a  woman  whom  he  never,  not  even  subse- 
quently, married,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Paine  separated  ;  not  through 
the  intervention  of  the  grim  tyrant  who  had  caused  the  sepa- 
ration between  Mr.  Paine  and  his  first  wife,  but  for  that  most 
heinous  of  all  imaginable  causes,  in  old  fogy  estimation,  mu- 
tual consent.  On  the  fourth  of  June,  in  the  year  just  designated, 
Mr.  Paine  signed  articles  of  agreement,  freely  relinquishing  to 
his  wife  all  the  property  of  which  marriage  had  legally  robbed 
her  for  his  benefit.  This  was  just ;  but  a  Thomas  Paine  would 
blush  to  call  it  magnanimous.  Behold  them  both,  in  the  prime  of 
life,  in  a  predicament  in  which  they  were  debarred,  by  the  inscru- 
table wisdom  of  society,  from  the  legal  exercise  of  those  func- 
tions on  which  nearly  all  their  enjoyments,  including  health 
itself,  depended. 

All  the  causes  of  this  separation  are  not  known.  Well, 
I'm  heartily  glad  of  it.  Yet  I  delight  not  in  beholding  vexa- 
tion and  disappointment,  even  though  the  victims  are  the  im- 
pertinently inquisitive.  Still,  I  repeat,  I'm  most  heartily 
glad  of  it 

That  neither  Mr.  nor  Mrs.  Paine  abused,  or  voluntarily 
even  offended  each  other,  is  conclusive  from  the  fact  that  Mr. 
Paine  always  spoke  very  respectfully  and  kindly  of  his  wife ; 
and,  says  the  veracious  Clio  Rickman,  "  frequently  seat  her 


PERIOD   FIRST.  9 

money,  without  letting  her  know  the  source  whence  it  came ;" 
and  Mrs.  Paine  always  held  her  husband  in  such  high  esteem, 
though  she  differed  widely  from  him  in  the  important  and 
complicated  matter  of  religion,  that  if  any  one  spoke  disre- 
spectfully of  him  in  her  presence,  she  deigned  not  a  word  of 
answer,  but  indignantly  left  the  room,  even  though  she  were 
at  table.  If  questioned  on  the  subject  of  her  separation  from 
her  marital  partner,  she  did  the  same.  Sensible  woman. 

"  Clio  Rickman  asserts,  and  the  most  intimate  friends  01 
Mr.  Paine  support  him,"  says  Mr.  Gilbert  Vale  in  his  excel- 
lent Life  of  Paine,*  to  which  I  here,  once  for  all,  acknowl- 
edge myself  much  indebted,  "  that  Paine  never  cohabited  with 
his  second  wife.  Sherwin  treats  the  subject  as  ridiculous ; 
but  Clio  Rickman  was  a  man  of  integrity,  and  he  asserts  that 
he  has  the  documents  showing  this  strange  point,  together 
with  others,  proving  that  this  arose  from  no  physical  defects 
in  Paine."  When  the  question  was  plainly  put  to  Mr.  Paine 
by  a  friend,  instead  of  spitting  in  the  questioner's  face,  or 
kicking  him,  he  replied  :  —  "I  had  a  cause  ;  it  is  no  business 
of  anybody."  Oh,  immortal  Paine !  Did  you  know  the  feel- 
ings which  the  writing  of  the  five  last  paragraphs  has  cost  me, 
you  would  forgive  ;  ay,  even  pity  me. 

And  now,  dear  public,  having,  to  please  you,  stepped  aside 
from  the  path  of  legitimate  history,  permit  me  to  continue 
the  digression  a  little,  in  order  to  please  myself.  Surely  you 
can  afford  some  extra  attention  to  one  who  has  sacrificed  his 
feelings,  and,  but  for  what  I  am  now  going  to  say,  will  have 
sacrificed  his  self-respect,  even,  for  your  accommodation. 

A  large  portion  of  the  Christian  world  believes  that  the 
marriage  tie,  once  formed,  should  continue  till  severed  by 
death,  or  adultery.  This  is  supposed  to  be, — first,  in  accor- 
dance with  scripture  ;  secondly,  in  accordance  with  the  best 
interests  of  society.  "  What  God  hath  joined,  let  not  man 
put  asunder,"  except  for  "  cause  of  adultery,"  is  the  text  in 
the  first  place,  and  the  prevention  of  licentiousness,  and  regard 
for  the  interests  of  children,  constitute  the  pretext  in  the 
eecond  place.  But  society  blindly  jumps  to  the  conclusion 
that  the  constantly  varying  decrees  of  legislative  bodies  desig- 
nate "  what  God  hath  joined,"  and  that  august  body  is  equally 
uncritical  with  respect  to  what  adultery,  both  according  to 
scripture  and  common  sense,  means.  When  any  joining  be- 

*  "  This  Life  of  Thomas  Paine,"  by  G.  Vale,  is  published  at  the  office 
of  that  most  able  advocate  of  free  discussion,  the  "  Boston  Investigator." 


10  LIFE   OF   THOMAS  PAINE. 

comes  abhorent  to  the  feelings  which  almighty  power  has  im- 
planted in  man,  to  attempt  to  force  the  continuance  of  such 
joining,  under  the  plea  of  authority  from  such  power,  is  most 
atrocious  ;  and  "  Jesus,"  or  whoever  spoke  in  his  name,  thus 
rationally  defines  adultery.  "Whoso  looketh  on  a  woman  to 
lust  after  her."  "  Jesus  "  did  not.  condemn  the  woman,  who, 
under  pressure  of  legal  restriction,  committed  the  "  very  act " 
of  adultery  ;  but  he  did  condemn  her  accusers,  in  the  severest 
and  most  cutting  manner  possible. 

We  have  already  shown  the  utter  disregard  which  the 
supposed  almighty  father  of  Jesus  showed — for  monogamic 
marriage ;  that  he  did  not  even  respect  vested  rights  in  the 
connection  ;  that  he  who  is  believed  to  have  said, — "  be  ye 
perfect  even  as  I  am  perfect,"  trampled  on  the  marital  rules 
according  to  which  the  poor  carpenter,  Joseph,  had  been  be- 
trothed to  his  Mary. 

How  well  the  son  of  Mary  followed  in  the  footsteps  of 
his  "  Almighty  "  father,  we  have  already  demonstrated  ;  and 
I  shall  close  all  I  have  to  say  on  the  supposed  divinity  of  this 
subject,  by  calling  the  attention  of  the  reader  to  the  high  re- 
spect which  ''  Jesus  "  paid  to  the  woman  who  had  had  five 
husbands,  and  who  was,  at  the  time  he  did  her  the  honor  to 
converse  with  her  in  public,  and  to  even  expound  his  mission 
to  her,  cohabiting  with  a  man  to  whom  she  was  not  married. 
Nothing  in  scripture  is  plainer,  than  that  Jesus  was  such  an 
out  and  out  free-lover  in  principle,  as  to  hold  that  as  soon  as 
married  people  looked  on  others  than  each  other  with  lust- 
ful eyes,  they  were  no  longer  so,  legally  ;  but  that  their  old 
connections  should  give  place  to  new  ones.  In  tne  perfect 
state  which  "  Jesus "  in  his  parabolical  language  called 
"  Heaven,"  he  explicitly  declared,  in  reference  to  what  the 
old  fogies  of  his  time  called  marriage,  "that  they  neither  marry 
nor  are  given  in  marriage  ;"  and  if  "  the  Saviour  "  said  this 
in  reprobation  of  the  comparatively  slight  bondage  which  en- 
cumbered marriage  in  Judea,  eighteen  hundred  years  ago, 
what  would  he  say,  were  he  to  visit  Christendom  at  the 
present  time  ? 

Wouldn't  he  make  the  "  whip  of  small  cords  "  with  which 
he  thrashed  the  money  changers,  whiz  about  the  ears  of 
those  legislators  and  judges,  who  dare  christen  their  tyranni- 
cal and  abominable  inventions  marriage !  who  have  the  au- 
dacity to  attribute  their  wretched  expedients  and  stupid  blun- 
ders to  eternal  wisdom  ? 

So  much  as  to  the  scriptural  view  of  marriage.     For  in- 


PERIOD   FIRST.  11 

formation  as  to  the  effects  of  "  legal  marriage  "  in  the  cure  of 
licentiousness,  and  in  promoting  the  welfare  of  children,  con- 
sult the  records  of  prostitution,  the  alms-house  registers,  and 
the  swarms  of  beggars,  by  which  you  are  continually  impor- 
tuned. As  to  the  effect  of  the  "  holy  bonds  "  on  domestic  feli- 
city, I  verily  believe  that  if  they  were  suddenly  and  com- 
pletely severed,  the  dealers  in  arsenic  who  happened  to  have 
but  little  stock  on  hand,  would  bless  their  lucky  stars. 

And  I  speak  from  a  knowledge  of  the  causes  which  either 
favorably  or  unfavorably  affect  the  human  organism,  in  say- 
ing, that  it  is  perfectly  certain,  that  if  the  unnatural  tie  which 
arrogates  the  name  of  marriage,  was  universally  severed,  sui- 
cide would  diminish  one  half,  idiocy  and  insanity  would  dis- 
appear, prolapsus  uteri  and  hysteria  would  be  almost  un- 
known, the  long  catalogue  of  diseases  consequent  on  hopeless 
despair,  dreary  ennui,  and  chronic  fretfulness,  would  be  shorn 
of  nine  tenths  its  present  length,  the  makers  of  little  shrouds 
and  coffins  would  have  little  or  nothing  to  do,  and  the  busi- 
ness of  abortionists  would  be  ruined.  In  short,  if  matrimo- 
nial bondage  was  abolished,  and  our  social  structure  reorgan- 
ized, so  as  to  correspond  with  the  change,  the  "  broken  spirit" 
that  "  drieth  the  bones,"  would  so  give  place  to  "  the  merry 
heart,  that  doeth  good  like  a  medicine,"  that  little  of  the 
doctor's  medicine  would  be  needed  ;  and  human  life  would  re- 
ceive an  accession  of  at  least  twenty  per  cent,  in  length,  and 
one  hundred  per  cent,  in  value. 

But  indissoluble  marriage,  and  its  correlates,  adultery, 
fornication,  prostitution,  the  unmentionable  crime  against 
nature,  and  masturbation,  are  part  and  parcel  of  the  present 
imperfect  condition  of  all  things  in  man's  connection ;  of  the 
remedy  for  which,  I  shall  treat,  when  I  come  to  consider  the 
universality  and  thoroughness  of  the  revolution  in  which 
Paine  was,  without  but  glimmeringly  perceiving  it,  so  efficient 
an  actor. 

In  1774,  Mr.  Paine  went  again  to  London  ;  where,  soon 
after  his  arrival,  he  made  the  acquaintance  of  Dr.  Franklin, 
(then  on  an  embassy  to  the  British  government,  from  one  of  her 
North  American  provinces,)  who,  perceiving  in  him  abilities 
of  no  ordinary  character,  advised  him  to  quit  his  native 
country,  where  he  was  surrounded  by  so  many  difficulties,  and 
try  his  fortune  in  America  ;  he  also  gave  him  a  letter  of  in- 
troduction to  one  of  his  most  intimate  friends  in  Philadelphia. 

Paine  left  England  towards  the  end  of  the  year  1774. 
and  arrived  in  Philadelphia  about  t\vo  months  thereafter. 


PERIOD  SECOND, 

1774—1787. 


MB.  PAINE'S  ARRIVAL  IN  AMERICA,  TO  HIS  DEPARTURE 
FOR  FRANCE  ;  EMBRACING  HIS  TRANSACTIONS  IN  THE 
AMERICAN  REVOLUTION. 

Shortly  after  the  arrival  of  Mr.  Paine  in  America,  he  was 
engaged  as  editor  of  the  Pennsylvania  Magazine,  the  publica- 
tion of  which  had  just  been  commenced,  by  Mr.  Aitkin,  book- 
seller, of  Philadelphia.  This  brought  him  acquainted  with 
Dr.  Rush. 

Up  to  this  period,  Paine  had  been  a  whig.  But  from  the 
practical  tone  of  much  of  his  editorial,  it  is  probable  that  he 
now  began  to  suspect  that  that  speculative  abstraction,  Brit- 
ish constitutionalism,  had  exhausted  its  usefulness  in  the 
economy  of  the  social  organism  ;  and  that  human  progress 
could  reach  a  higher  plane  than  that,  the  foundations  of  which 
were  a  theological  church  establishment,  and  its  correspond- 
ing hotch-potch  of  kings,  lords,  and  commons.  And  here  I 
will  remark,  that  Paine's  distinguishing  characteristic — the 
trait  which  constituted  his  greatness — was  his  capability  of 
being  ahead  of  his  time.  Were  he  bodily  present  now,  he 
would  be  as  far  in  advance  of  the  miserable  sham  of  freedom 
to  which  the  majorityism  which  he  advocated,  though  pro- 
visionally necessary,  has  dwindled,  as  he  was  in  advance  of  the 
governmental  expedient,  which  reached  the  stage  of  effete- 
ness  in  his  day.  "  The  Crisis,"  instead  of  commencing  with 
''  These  are  the  times  that  try  men's  "  souls,"  would  begin 
with  "  These  are  the  times  that  exhaust  men's  power  of  en- 
durance." Demagogism,  with  the  whole  power  of  the  majority 
to  enforce  its  tyranny,  has  declared  that  "  to  the  victors  be- 
long the  spoils  ;"  that  it  has  a  right  to  bind  the  minority  in 
all  cases  whatsoever.  Its  recklessness  is  in  complete  contrast 
with  the  regard  which  even  Britain  pays  to  the  interests  of 
her  subjects  ;  and  in  taxation,  and  peculation  in  office,  it  out- 
does Austrian  despotism  itself." 


PERIOD   SECOND  18 

"  Majorityisin  has  carried  its  insolence  so  far  as  to  des- 
pise nothing  so  much  as  the  name  and  memory  of  him  who 
risked  his  life,  his  honor,  his  all,  to  protect  its  infancy  ;  it 
has  scornfully  refused  his  portrait  a  place  on  the  walls  of  the 
very  hall  which  once  rang  with  popular  applause  of  the  elo- 
quence, which  his  soul-stirring  pleas  for  elective  franchise  in- 
spired." 

"  Yes  ;  the  city  council  of  Philadelphia  has,  in  1859,  in 
obedience  to  the  commands  of  that  public  opinion,  which  was 
the  court  of  last  appeal,  of  him  who  first,  on  this  continent, 
dared  pronounce  the  words  American  Independence,  refused 
his  portrait  a  place  by  the  side  of  his  illustrious  co-workers  ; 
thus  rebuking,  and  most  impudently  insulting  Washington, 
who  in  an  exstacy  of  admiration  grasped  the  hand  of  the 
author  of  "  Common  Sense,"and  invited  him  to  share  his 
table  ;  Franklin,  who  invited  him  to  our  shores  ;  Lafayette, 
to  whom  he  was  dearer  than  a  brother  ;  Barlow,  who  pro- 
nounced him  "  one  of  the  most  benevolent  and  disinterested 
of  mankind  ;"  Thomas  Jefferson,  who  sent  a  government  ship 
to  reconduct  him  to  our  shores  ;  and  all  the  friends  of  popu- 
lar suffrage  in  France,  who,  at  the  time  that  tried  men's  souls 
there,  elected  him  to  their  national  councils." 

"  Like  the  Turkish  despot,  who  cut  off  the  head,  and  blot- 
ted out  of  existence  the  family,  of  his  prime  minister,  to  whom 
he  owed  the  preservation  of  his  throne,  majorityism  has 
crowded  the  name  of  its  chief  apostle  almost  out  of  the  his- 
tory of  its  rise. " 

"  Freedom  of  speech,  particularly  on  religious  subjects,  and 
on  the  government's  pet  project,  is  a  myth ;  every  seventh 
day,  the  freedom  of  action  is  restricted  to  going  to  church, 
dozing  away  the  time  in  the  house,  taking  a  disreputable 
stroll,  or  venturing  on  a  not  strictly  legal  ride.  We  have 
nothing  like  the  amount  of  individual  freedom  which  is  en- 
joyed by  the  men  and  women  of  imperially  governed  France; 
and  notwithstanding  the  muzzling  of  the  press  by  Louis  Na- 
poleon, there  could  be  published  within  the  very  shade  of  the 
TuiUeries,a  truer  and  more  liberal  history  of  Democracy  ar<l 
its  leaders,  and  of  American  Independence,  than  any  consider- 
able house,  except  the  one  from  which  this  emanates,  dare 
put  forth,  within  the  vast  area  over  which  the  star-spangled 
banner  waves. 

This  is  but  a  tithe  of  the  despotism  which  public  opinion, 
free  to  be  formed  by  priests,  and  directed  by  demagogues, 
has  inflicted  :  but  a  faint  view  of  how  abominably  prostituted 


14  LIFE   OF   THOMAS  PAINE. 

liberty  must  inevitably  become,  if  unregulated  by  science,  [f 
democracy  has  not  exhausted  all  the  good  there  was  in  it — 
if  majorityism  has  not  become  effete,  and  as  obnoxious  to 
progress  as  monarchy  ever  was — in  short,  if  what  is  now  called 
liberty,  is  not  slavery,  there  is  not  such  a  thing  as  slavery  on 
the  earth." 

At  the  close  of  the  year  1775,  when  the  American  Revo- 
lution had  progressed  as  far  as  the  battles  of  Lexington  and 
Bunker  Hill,  John  Adams,  Benjamin  Rush,  Benjamin  Frank- 
lin, and  George  Washington,  had  met  together  to  read  thf 
terrible  dispatches  they  had  received.  Having  done  which 
they  pause  in  gloom  and  silence.  Presently  Franklin  speaks : 
"  What,"  he  asks,  "  is  to  be  the  end  of  all  this  ?  Is  it  to 
obtain  justice  of  Great  Britain,  to  change  the  ministry, 

to  soften  a  tax  ?     Or  is  it  for" He  paused  ;  the  word 

independence  yet  choked  the  bravest  throat  that  sought  to 
utter  it. 

At  this  critical  moment,  Paine  enters.  Franklin  intro- 
duces him,  and  he  takes  his  seat.  He  well  knows  the  cause 
of  the  prevailing  gloom,  and  breaks  the  deep  silence  thus  : 
"  These  States  of  America  must  be  independent  of  England. 
That  is  the  only  solution  of  this  question !"  They  all  rise  to 
their  feet  at  this  political  blasphemy.  But.  nothing  daunted,  he 
goes  on  ;  his  eye  lights  up  with  patriotic  fire  as  he  paints  the 
glorious  destiny  which  America,  considering  her  vast  resources, 
ought  to  achieve,  and  adjures  them  to  lend  their  influence  to 
rescue  the  Western  Continent  from  the  absurd,  unnatural, 
and  unprogressive  predicament  of  being  governed  by  a  small 
island,  three  thousand  miles  off.  Washington  leaped  forward, 
and  taking  both  his  hands,  besought  him  to  publish  these 
views  in  a  book. 

Paine  went  to  his  room,  seized  his  pen,  lost  sight  of  every 
other  object,  toiled  incessantly,  and  in  December,  1775,  the 
work  entitled  Common  Sense,  which  caused  the  Declaration 
of  Independence,  and  brought  both  people  and  their  leaders 
face  to  face  with  the  work  they  had  to  accomplish,  was  sent 
forth  on  its  mission.  "  That  book,"  says  Dr.  Rush,  "  burst 
forth  from  the  press  with  an  effect  that  has  been  rarely 
produced  by  types  and  paper,  in  any  age  or  country." 

"  Have  you  seen  the  pamphlet,  Common  Sense  ?"  asked 
Major  General  Lee,  in  a  letter  to  Washington  ;  "  I  never  saw 
such  a  masterly,  irresistible  performance.  It  will,  if  I  mistake 
not,  in  concurrence  with  the  transcendent  folly  and  wicked- 
ness of  the  ministry,  give  the  coup-de-grace  to  Great  Britain 


PERIOD   SECOND.  15 

In  short,  I  own  myself  convinced  by  the  arguments,  of  the 
necessity  of  separation." 

That  idea  of  Independence  the  pen  of  Paine  fed  with  fuel 
from  his  brain  when  it  was  growing  dim.  We  cannot  over- 
rate the  electric  power  of  that  pen.  At  one  time  Washing- 
ton thought  that  his  troops,  disheartened,  almost  naked,  and 
half  starved,  would  entirely  disband.  But  the  Author-Hero 
of  the  Revolution  was  tracking  their  march  and  writing  by 
the  light  of  camp-fires  the  series  of  essays  called  The  Crisis. 
And  when  the  veterans  who  still  clung  to  the  glorious  cause 
they  had  espoused  were  called  together,  these  words  broke 
forth  upon  them  :  "  These  are  the  times  that  try  men's 
souls.  The  summer  soldier  and  the  sunshine  patriot  will,  in 
this  crisis,  shrink  from  the  service  of  his  country  ;  but 
he  that  stands  it  now,  deserves  the  love  and  thanks  of  man  and 
woman.  Tyranny,  like  Hell,  is  not  easily  conquered  ;  yet  we 
have  this  consolation  with  us,  that  the  harder  the  conflict,  the 
more  glorious  the  triumph." 

"  These  are  the  times  that  try  mens  souls"  was  the  watchword 
at  the  battle  of  Trenton,  and  Washington  himself  set  the  pen 
of  Paine  above  any  sword  wielded  that  day.  But  we  need 
not  dwell  on  the  fact  of  Paine's  services  and  influence  at  this 
eventful  period.  He  stood  the  acknowledged  leader  of 
American  statemanship,  and  the  soul  of  the  American  Revo- 
lution, by  the  proclamation  of  the  Legislatures  of  all  the 
States,  and  that  of  the  Congress  of  the  United  States  ;  the 
tribute  of  his  greatest  enemy  was  in  these  words  :  "  The  can- 
non of  Washington  was  not  more  formidable  to  the  British 
than  the  pen  of  the  author  of  Common  Sense."  A  little 
less  modesty,  a  little  more  preference  of  himself,  to  humanity, 
and  a  good  deal  more  of  what  ought  to  be  common  sense  on 
the  part  of  the  people  he  sought  to  free,  and  he  would  have 
been  President  of  the  United  States ;  and  America,  instead 
of  France,  would  have  had  the  merit  of  bestowing  the  highest 
honor  on  the  most  deserving  of  mankind. 

If  Paine  had  been  consulted  to  the  extent  he  ought  to  have 
been,  by  those  who  modeled  the  republic  he  was  so  instru- 
mental in  starting  into  existence,  our  social  structure  would 
have  been  so  founded,  that  it  might  have  lasted  till  super- 
seded by  the  immeasurably  better  one  to  which  I  shall 
presently  allude,  and  to  which,  as  I  shall  show,  his  measures 
aimed.  It  would  not  notv  depend  upon  a  base  so  uncertain 
that  it  has  to  be  carefully  shored  up  by  such  props  as  gibbets, 
prisons,  alms  houses,  and  soup-dispensing  committees,  in  order 


16  LIFE   OF   THOMAS   PAINE. 

to  prevent  its  being  sapped  by  the  hunger-driven  slaves  of 
"  free  labor,"  nor  would  our  Union  be  already  in  such  danger 
of  falling  to  pieces,  that  the  cords  which  bind  it  together  are 
as  flimsy  as  cotton,  and  as  rotten  as  are  the  souls  of  those 
who  expose  both  their  religious  and  their  political  opinions 
for  sale  as  eagarly  as  they  do  their  most  damaged  goods. 

On  the  17th  of  April,  1777,  Congress  elected  Mr.  Paine 
secretary  to  the  committee  of  foreign  affairs.  In  this  capa- 
city, he  stood  in  the  same  relation  to  the  committee  that  the 
English  secretary  for  foreign  affairs  did  to  the  cabinet ;  and 
it  was  not  from  vanity,  but  in  order  to  preserve  the  dignity 
of  the  new  government  under  which  he  acted,  that  he  claimed 
the  title  which  was  bestowed  on  the  British  minister,  who 
performed  a  function  corresponding  to  his  own. 

"  The  Crisis  "  is  contained  in  sixteen  numbers  ;  to  notice 
which,  separately,  would  involve  a  history  of  the  American 
Revolution  itself.  In  fact,  they  comprise  a  truer  history  of 
that  event  than  does  any  professed  history  of  it  yet  written. 
They  comprise  the  soul  of  it,  of  which  every  professed  history 
is  destitute.  A  disgrace  which  this  country  can  never  wipe 
out. 

In  January,  1779,  Paine  resigned  his  secretaryship,  in 
consequence  of  a  misunderstanding  which  had  tak'en  place 
between  him  and  congress,  on  account  of  one  Silas  Deane. 

In  the  early  part  of  the  war,  it  appears  that  Deane  had 
been  employed  as  an  agent  in  France,  for  the  purpose  of  ob- 
taining supplies,  either  as  a  loan  from  the  French  government, 
or,  if  he  failed  in  this,  to  purchase  them.  But  before  enter- 
ing on  the  duties  of  his  office,  Dr.  Franklin  and  Mr.  Lee 
were  added  to  the  mission,  and  the  three  proceeded  to  Paris 
for  the  same  purpose.  The  French  monarch,  more  perhaps 
from  his  hostility  to  the  English  government,  than  from  any 
attachment  to  the  American  cause,  acceded  to  the  request ; 
and  the  supplies  were  immediately  furnished.  As  France 
was  then  upon  amicable  terms  with  England,  a  pledge  was 
given  by  the  American  commissioners  that  the  affair  should 
remain  a  secret.  The  supplies  were  accordingly  shipped  in 
the  name  of  a  Mr.  Beaumarchais,  and  consigned  to  an  imagi- 
nary house  in  the  United  States.  Deane,  taking  advantage 
of  the  secresy  which  had  been  promised,  presented  a  claim  for 
compensation  in  behalf  of  himself  and  Beaumarchais  ;  think 
ing  that  the  auditing  committee  would  prefer  compliance  to 
an  exposure  of  their  ally,  the  king  of  France,  to  a  rupture  with 
England.  Mr.  Paine,  perceiving  the  trick,  and  knowing  the 


PERIOD   SECOND.  17 

circumstances  of  the  case,  resolved  on  laying  the  transaction 
before  the  public.  He  accordingly  wrote  for  the  newspapers 
several  essays,  under  the  title  of  "  Common  Sense  to  the  Pub- 
lic on  Mr.  Deane's  Affairs,"  in  which  he  exposed  the  dis- 
honest designs  of  Deane.  The  business,  in  consequence,  soon 
became  a  subject  of  general  conversation :  the  demand  was 
rejected  by  the  auditing  committee,  and  Deane  soon  afterward 
absconded  to  England. 

For  this  piece  of  service  to  the  Americans,  Paine  was 
thanked  and  applauded  by  the  people ;  but  by  this  time  a 
party  had  begun  to  form  itself,  whose  principles,  if  not  the 
reverse  of  independence,  were  the  reverse  of  republicanism. 
These  men  had  long  envied  the  popularity  of  Paine,  but  from 
their  want  of  means  to  check  or  control  it,  they  had  hitherto 
remained  silent.  An  opportunity  was  now  offered  for  venting 
their  spleen.  Mr.  Paine,  in  exposing  the  trickery  of  Deane, 
had  incautiously  mentioned  one  or  two  circumstances  that 
had  come  to  his  knowledge  in  consequence  of  his  office  ;  this 
was  magnified  into  a  breach  of  confidence,  and  a  plan  was 
immediately  formed  for  depriving  him  of  his  situation  ;  accor- 
dingly, a  motion  was  made  for  an  order  to  bring  him  before 
congress.  Mr.  Paine  readily  attended  ;  and  on  being  asked 
whether  the  articles  in  question  were  written  by  him,  he  re- 
plied that  they  were.  He  was  then  directed  to  withdraw. 
As  soon  as  he  had  left  the  house,  a  member  arose  and  moved  : 
"  That  Thomas  Paine  be  discharged  from  the  office  of  secre- 
tary to  the  committee  for  foreign  affairs  ;"  but  the  motion 
was  lost  upon  a  division.  Mr.  Paine  then  wrote  to  congress, 
requesting  that  he  might  be  heard  in  his  own  defence,  and 
Mr.  Lawrence  made  a  motion  for  that  purpose,  which  was 
negatived.  The  next  day  he  sent  in  his  resignation,  conclu- 
ding with  these  words  :  "  As  I  cannot,  consistently  with  my 
character  as  a  freeman,  submit  to  be  censured  unheard  ;  there- 
fore, to  preserve  that  character  and  maintain  that  right,  I 
think  it  my  duty  to  resign  the  office  of  secretary  to  the  com- 
mittee for  foreign  affairs ;  and  I  do  hereby  resign  the 
same." 

This  conduct  on  the  part  of  congress  may,  in  some  degree, 
be  attributed  to  a  desire  to  quiet  the  fears  of  the  French  am- 
bassador, who  had  become  very  dissatisfied  in  consequence 
of  its  being  known  to  the  world  that  the  supplies  were  a 
present  from  his  master.  To  silence  his  apprehensions,  and 
preserve  the  friendship  of  the  French  court,  they  treated 
Paine  with  ingratitude.  This  they  acknowledged  at  a  future 


18  LIFE   OF   THOMAS   PAINE. 

period  by  a  grant ;  of  which  I  shall  have  occasion  to  speak 
in  its  proper  place. 

Paine  was  now  deprived  of  the  means  of  obtaining  a  live- 
lihood ;  and  being  averse  to  rendering  his  literary  labors 
subservient  to  his  personal  wants,  he  engaged  himself  as 
clerk  to  Mr.  Biddle,  an  attorney  at  Philadelphia. 

The  ingratitude  of  congress  produced  no  change  in  Mr. 
Paine's  patriotism.  On  every  occasion,  he  continued  to  dis- 
play the  same  degree  of  independence  and  resolution,  which 
had  first  animated  him  in  favor  of  the  republican  cause.  He 
had  enlisted  himself  as  a  volunteer  in  the  American  cause  ; 
and  he  vindicated  her  rights  under  every  change  of  circum- 
stance, with  unabated  ardor. 

In  a  communication  made  many  years  afterwards  to 
Cheetham,  (who  would  have  contradicted  it,  could  he  have 
done  so  without  stating  what  every  one  would  immediately 
know  to  be  false,)  he  says  : — 

"  I  served  in  the  army  the  whole  of  the  '  time  that  tried 
men's  souls,'  from  the  beginning  to  the  end. 

Soon  after  the  declaration  of  independence,  July  4,  1776, 
congress  recommended  that  a  body  of  ten  thousand  men,  to 
be  called  the  flying  camp,  because  it  was  to  act  wherever  ne- 
cessary, should  be  formed  from  the  militia  and  volunteers  of 
Jersey,  Pennsylvania,  and  Maryland.  I  went  with  one  divi- 
sion from  Pennsylvania,  under  General  Roberdeau.  We 
were  stationed  at  Perth  Amboy,  and  afterward  at  Bergen  ; 
and  when  the  time  of  the  flying  camp  expired,  and  they  went 
home,  I  went  to  Fort  Lee,  and  served  as  aid-de-camp  to 
Greene,  who  commanded  at  Fort  Lee,  and  was  with  him 
through  the  whole  of  the  black  times  of  that  trying  cam- 
paign. 

I  began  the  first  number  of  the  "  Crisis,"  beginning  with 
the  well-known  expression,  '  These  are  the  times  that  try 
men's  souls',  at  Newark,  upon  the  retreat  from  Fort  Lee,  and 
continued  writing  it  at  every  place  we  stopped  at,  and  had  it 
printed  at  Philadelphia,  the  19th  of  December,  six  days  before 
the  taking  the  Hessians  at  Trenton,  which,  with  the  affair  at 
Princeton,  the  week  after,  put  an  end  to  the  black  times." 

Soon  after  the  resignation  of  his  secretaryship,  he  was 
chosen  clerk  of  the  legislature  of  Pennsylvania.  This  appoint- 
ment is  a  proof  that,  though  he  had  some  enemies,  he  had 
many  friends;  and  that  the  malicious  insinuations  of  the 
former  had  not  been  able  to  weaken  the  attachment  of  the 
latter. 


PERIOD   SECOND.  19 

In  February,  1781,  Paine,  at  the  earnest  solicitation  of 
Colonel  Laurens,  accompanied  him  to  France,  on  a  mission 
which  the  former  had  himself  set  on  foot,  which  was,  to  ob- 
tain of  the  French  government  a  loan  of  a  million  sterling 
annually  during  the  war.  This  mission  was  so  much. more 
successful  tfcan  they  expected,  that  six  millions  of  livres  as  a 
present,  and  ten  millions  as  a  loan,  was  the  result.  They 
sailed  from  Brest,  at  the  beginning  of  June,  and  arrived  at 
Boston  in  August,  having  under  their  charge  two  millions 
and  a  half  in  silver,  and  a  ship  and  a  brig  laden  with  cloth- 
ing and  military  stores. 

Before  going  to  France,  as  just  narrated,  Paine  headed  a 
private  subscription  list,  with  the  sum  of  five  hundred  dollars, 
all  the  money  he  could  raise  ;  and  the  nobleness  of  his  con- 
duct so  stimulated  the  munificence  of  others,  that  the  sub- 
scriptions amounted  to  the  generous  sum  of  three  hundred 
thousand  pounds. 

Soon  after  the  war  of  Independence  had  been  brought  to 
a  successful  termination,  Mr.  Paine  returned  to  Bordentown, 
in  New  Jersey,  where  he  had  a  small  property.  Washing- 
ton, rationally  fearing  that  one  so  devoted  and  generous 
might  be  in  circumstances  not  the  most  flourishing,  wrote  to 
him  the  following  letter  : — 

ROCKY  HILL,  Sept.  10,  1783. 

I  have  learned,  since  I  have  been  at  this  place,  that  you 
are  at  Bordentown.  Whether  for  the  sake  of  retirement  or 
economy,  I  know  not.  Be  it  for  either,  for  both,  or  what- 
ever it  may,  if  you  will  come  to  this  place  and  partake  with 
me,  I  shall  be  exceedingly  happy  to  see  you  at  it. 

Your  presence  may  remind  congress  of  your  past  services 
to  this  country  ;  and  if  it  is  in  my  power  to  impress  them, 
command  my  best  exertions  with  freedom,  as  they  will  be 
rendered  cheerfully  by  one  who  entertains  a  lively  sense  of 
the  importance  of  your  works,  and  who,  with  much  pleasure, 
subscribes  himself. 

Your  sincere  friend, 

G.  Washington. 

In  1785,  congress,  on  the  report  of  a  committee  consisting 
of  Mr.  Gerry,  Mr.  Petit,  and  Mr.  King, 

Resolved,  That  the  board  of  treasury  take  order  for  pay- 
ing to  Mr.  Thomas  Paine,  the  sum  of  three  thousand  dol- 
lars. 

This,  however,  was  not  a  gratuity,  although  it  took  that 
shape.  It  was  but  little  if  any  more  than  was  due  Mr.  Paine, 


20  LIFE   OF   THOMAS   PAINE. 

in  consequence  of  the  depreciation  of  the  continental  money 
in  which  his  salary  as  secretary  of  the  committee  of  foreign 
affairs  had  been  paid. 

Mr.  Paine  had  resolved  not  to  make  any  application  to 
the  congress  on  the  score  of  his  literary  labors  ;  but  he  had 
several  friends  in  the  provincial  assemblies  who  were  deter- 
mined that  his  exertions  should  not  pass  unrewarded. 
Through  their  influence,  motions  in  his  favor  were  brought 
before  the  legislature  of  Pennsylvania  and  the  assembly  of 
New  York ;  the  former  gave  him  £500,  and  the  latter  the 
confiscated  estate  of  a  Mr.  Frederick  Devoe,  a  royalist.  This 
estate,  situated  at  New  Rochelle,  consisting  of  more  than 
three  hundred  acres  of  land  in  a  high  state  of  cultivation, 
with  a  spacious  and  elegant  stone  house,  beside  extensive  out- 
buildings, was  a  valuable  acquisition  ;  and  the  readiness  with 
which  it  was  granted,  is  a  proof  of  the  high  estimation  in 
which  Mr.  Paine's  services  were  held  by  one  of  the  most  opu- 
lent and  powerful  states  in  the  Union. 

In  1786,  he  published  at  Philadelphia,  his  "  Dissertations 
on  Government,"  "The  Affairs  of  the  Bank,"  and  "Paper- 
Money."  The  bank  alluded  to  was  the  one  which  had  been 
established  some  years  before,  under  the  name  of  the  "  Bank 
of  North  America,"  on  the  capital  of  the  three  hundred  thou- 
sand pounds,  which  resulted  from  the  subscription  which 
Paine  headed  with  five  hundred  dollars,  as  has  already  been 
stated  ;  which  bank,  instead  of  being  what  banks  now  are, — 
the  stimulants  of  a  gambling  credit  system,  and  a  ruinous  im- 
porting system,  had  been  of  vast  use  to  the  cause  of  our  na- 
tional independence.  Paine  advocated  a  paper  currency  when 
it  was  of  use,  instead  of  being  an  abuse  ;  in  his  days  it  helped 
to  secure  national  independence,  instead  of  subjecting  the 
country,  as  it  now  does,  to  a  servitude  to  the  interests  of  Eng- 
land, which  could  she  have  foreseen,  it  is  questionable  whether 
even  British  pride  would  not  have  so  succumbed  to  British 
avarice,  that  not  a  gun  would  have  been  fired,  or  a  sword 
drawn  against  us.  England  could  have  afforded  to  pay  ua 
as  many  pounds  for  subjecting  ourselves  as  we  have  done  to 
her  interests,  as  it  cost  her  pennies  to  vainly  attempt  to  pre- 
vent us  from  doing  this.  It  is  highly  worthy  of  remark,  that 
Paine  opposed  giving  even  the  Independence  promoting  Bank 
of  North  America,  a  perpetual  charter. 

At  this  time  Mr.  Paine  was  highly  popular,  and  enjoyed 
the  esteem  and  friendship  of  the  most  literary,  scientific,  and 
patriotic  men  of  the  age 


PERIOD  THIRD, 

1787—1809. 


MB.  PAINE  GOES  TO  EUROPE.    His  REVOLUTIONARY  MOVE- 
MENTS IN  ENGLAND.    Is  ELECTED  A  MEMBER  OF  THE 
NATIONAL  ASSEMBLY  OF  FRANCE.    TAKES  AN 
ACTIVE  PART  IN  THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION. 
His  DEATH, 

THE  success  which  had  crowned  Mr.  Paine's  exertions  in 
America,  made  him  resolve  to  try  the  effects  of  his  influence 
in  the  very  citadel  of  the  foes  of  liberal  principles  in  govern- 
ment, whose  out-posts  he  had  stormed.  As  America  no 
longer  needed  his  aid,  he  resolved  to  attack  the  English 
government  at  home  ;  to  free  England  herself. 

Accordingly,  in  April,  1787,  he  sailed  from  the  United 
States  for  France,  and  arrived  in  Paris  after  a  short  passage. 
His  knowledge  of  mechanics  and  natural  philosophy  had 
procured  him  the  honor  of  being  admitted  a  member  of  the 
American  Philosophical  society  ;  he  was  also  admitted  Mas- 
ter of  Arts  by  the  university  of  Philadelphia.  These  honors, 
though  not  of  much  consequence  in  themselves,  were  the 
means  of  introducing  him  to  some  of  the  most  scientific  men 
in  France,  and  soon  after  his  arrival  he  exhibited  to  the 
Academy  of  Sciences,  the  model  of  an  iron  bridge  which  had 
occupied  much  of  his  leisure  time  during  his  residence  in 
America.  This  model  received  the  unqualified  approbation 
of  the  Academy,  and  it  was  afterwards  adopted  by  the  most 
scientific  men  of  England. 

From  Paris  Mr.  Paine  proceeded  to  London,  where  he  ar- 
rived on  the  third  of  September.  Before  the  end  of  that 
month  he  went  to  Thetford  to  see  his  mother,  who  was  now 
borne  down  by  age,  and  was,  besides,  in  very  straightened 
circumstances.  His  father,  it  appears,  had  died  during  his 


22  LIFE  OF   THOMAS   PAINE. 

absence  ;  and  he  hastened  to  the  place  of  his  birth  to  relieve 
the  wants  of  his  surviving  parent.  He  led  a  recluse  sort  of 
life  at  Thetford  for  several  weeks,  being  principally  occupied 
in  writing  a  pamphlet  on  the  state  of  the  nation,  under  the 
title  of  "  Prospects  on  the  Rubicon."  This  was  published  in 
London,  toward  the  end  of  the  year  1787. 

During  the  year  1788,  Mr.  Paine  was  principally  occupied 
in  building  his  bridge.  For  this  purpose  he  went  to  Rother- 
ham  in  Yorkshire,  in  order  that  he  might  have  an  opportu- 
nity of  superintending  its  iron  castings. 

The  situation  of  France  had  now  become  of  great  interest 
to  all  Europe,  and  Mr.  Paine  was  in  the  confidence  of  the  chief 
actors  in  the  great  events  which  were  there  taking  place,  and 
he  hastened  again  to  Paris  to  witness  and  assist  in  the*  down- 
fall of  Bourbon  despotism  ;  to  act  his  part  in  the  great,  drama 
of  freedom,  the  scene  of  which  had  shifted  from  the  land  of 
Washington  to  the  country  of  Lafayette. 

The  French  are  peculiarly  sensitive  to  the  shafts  of 
ridicule  ;  and  Voltaire,*  taking  a  wise  advantage  of  this,  had 
made  such  good  use  of  his  exquisite  wit,  that  both  priestcraft 
and  statecraft  had  become  rather  absurd  than  respectable  in  the 
estimation  of  the  higher  orders  of  those  who  held  both  their 
wealth  and  their  positions  under  such  patronage. 

The  writings  of  the  Abbe  Raynal  had  imbued  the  French 
with  respect  for  the  natural  rights  of  humanity,  and  conse- 
quently with  contempt  and  abhorrence  for  the  vested  rights 
of  tyrants  ;  and  the  writings  of  that  great  apostle  of  liberty, 
Rousseau,  had  long  been  preparing  the  way,  in  France,  for  what 
those  of  Paine  had  effected  in  America  ;  in  fact,  Rousseau 
was  the  "  author  hero"  of  the  French  Revolution  ;  and  it 
was  more  owing  to  his  pen,  than  to  anything  else,  that  the 
views  of  the  people  of  France  so  differed  from  these  of  their 
rulers,  that,  whilst  the  latter,  in  assisting  America  to  throw 
off  the  British  yoke,  looked  no  further  than  the  weakening 
and  humiliating  of  England,  the  former  approved  of,  and 
sustained  the  measure,  as  initiatory  to  the  destruction  of 
monarchy  itself. 

The  return  from  America  of  the  troops  of  Lafayette  had 
furnished  a  vast  reinforcement  to  the  popular  cause,  and  in- 
fused its  principles  throughout  all  France.  Mr.  Paine 
remarks,  that — 

*  That  Encyclopedia  of  wit  and  wisdom,  Voltaire's  "Philosophies./  I/io- 
tionary,''  is  published  by  Mr.  J.  P.  Mendum,  at  the  office  of  tne 
Investigator." 


PERIOD   THIRD.  23 

"  As  it  was  impossible  to  separate  the  military  events 
which  took  place  in  America  from  the  principles  of  the 
American  revolution,  the  publication  of  those  events  in  France 
necessarily  connected  themselves  with  the  principles  that  pro- 
duced them.  Many  of  the  facts  were  in  themselves  principles  ; 
such  as  the  Declaration  of  American  Independence,  and  the 
treaty  of  alliance  between  France  and  America,  which 
recognized  the  natural  rights  of  man,  and  justified  resistance 
to  oppression." 

This  is  the  proper  place  to  show  that  neither  Paine,  Rous- 
seau, nor  Voltaire  are  at  all  chargeable  with  the  abomina- 
tions which  have  been  perpetrated,  both  in  America  and 
France,  in  the  name  of  liberty  ;  and  that  our  "  scurvy  politi- 
cians "  have  no  more  business  to  spout  their  impudent  clap- 
trap in  the  name  of  the  principles  advocated  by  the  author  of 
"  The  Rights  of  Man,"  than  Marat,  St.  Just,  and  Robespierre, 
had  to  mouth  Rousseau.  Nothing  is  plainer,  than  that  the 
two  great  moving  minds  in  the  American  and  French  revolu- 
tions aimed  at  the  practical  actualization  of  liberty. 

Had  Rousseau  awoke  from  the  dead  at  the  time  of  the 
French  Revolution, —  "  What !"  he  would  have  exclaimed. 
"  Do  you  take  carnage  to  be  what  I  meant  by  the  state  of  na- 
ture?" "Miscreants!"  Paine  would  thunder  in  the  ears  of 
our  rulers,  were  he  now  to  visit  the  land  over  which  the  star- 
spangled  banner  waves.  "  Is  elective  franchise  to  end  in  ma- 
jority-despotism and  spoils?  Do  you  thin^k  I  meant  caucus 
trickery,  election  frauds,  office  gambling,  corruption, — in  short, 
demagogism,  when  I  said  free  government  ? 

"Are  my  teachings  to  be  estimated  from  the  stand-point 
where  'tis  difficult,  if  not  impossible  to  determine  whether 
*  free  laborers '  or  '  slaves '  have  the  most  uncomfortable 
time  of  it  ?  In  the  name  of  '  Common  Sense,'  I  protest  against 
your  gross  misrepresentation  of  me.  The  contemptible  knave 
and  fool  game  which  you  are  playing  in  the  name  of  liberty, 
is  but  the  back  step  of  the  forward  one  towards  freedom, 
which  I  helped  mankind  to  take. 

Call  you  your  miserable  hotch-potch  of  spent  supernatural- 
ism  and  worn  out  absolutism,  what  I  meant  by  freedom  ? 
You  might  as  well  call  a  rotting  heap  of  building  material?, 
which  some  architect,  whose  skill  was  far  in  advance  of  his 
time,  had  not  lived  long  enough  to  put  together  accor'V.njf  to 
his  design,  the  edifice  which  he  intended. 


24  LIFE   OF   THOMAS   PAINE. 

"Ye  infidels,*  who  meanly  and  hypocritically  sneak  for 
patronage  under  the  shreds  and  tatters  of  the  worn  out  cloak 
of  the  church,  or  who  quit  the  ranks  of  superstition,  only  to 
wasie  your  energies  over  an.  old  book  which  I  completely 
emasculated  (but  lived  to  discover  that  I  had  mistaken  a 
prominent  symptom  for  the  disease  I  sought  to  cure  ;)  or  to 
dispute  and  wrangle  over  mere  speculative  abstractions,  or 
at  most,  to  eat  and  drink  and  dance,  and  talk  in  memory  of 
me,  every  twenty-ninth  of  January,  when  it  does  not  fall  on  a 
Sunday.  In  calling  on  my  name,  and  looking  backward  in 
unavailing  admiration  of  what  I  did,  instead  of  pushing 
ahead  and  carrying  on  the  work  which  I  began,  you  confer 
no  more  honor  on  me  than  modern  Christians  do  on  their 
"  Jesus."  You  are  no  more  like  me,  than  papists  and  pro- 
testants  are  the  true  followers  of  the  Pharisee-condemning, 
Sabbath-breaking  son  of  the  world-famous  carpenter  of 
Galilee. 

"My  religion  was  '  to  do  good.'  Yours  has  thus  far  been 
to  do  nothing  or  worse  than  nothing. 

"Why  do  you  not  organize,  and  have  your  own  schools,  in- 
stead of  allowing  your  children  to  be  supernaturalistically 
educated  ?  You  allow  the  reasoning  faculties  of  the  scions 
of  humanity  to  be  completely  maimed,  and  then  blame  nature 
because  they  are  '  vicious ;'  or,  like  idiots  holding  candles 
for  the  blind  to  read  by,  you  ply  them  with  reason,  when  they 
arrive  at  the  age  when  they  ought  to  be  reasonable,  but  are 
confirmed  in  folly  instead.  Has  the  freedom  of  the  people 
to  chose  their  own  teachers  and  head  their  own  churches, 
culminated  in  schools,  the  very  hot-beds  of  superstition,  and 
in  churches  more  intimately  connected  with,  and  more  ex- 
pensive to  the  state,  sub  rosa,  than  the  Catholic  church  openly 
is,  even  in  Rome  ? 

"Why  do  you  not  elevate  woman,  instead  of  letting  your 
daughters  grow  up  under  the  influence  of  the  priests  ?  Why 
do  you  so  stubbornly  cling  to  that  immaculate  abortion  ;  that 
most  pestiferous  effluvia  of  supernaturalism ;  that  quintes- 
sence of  malice  ;  that  thickest  fog  that  ever  darkened  the  un- 
derstanding ;  that  strong-hold  of  all  that  is  arbitrary ;  that 
refinement  of  cruelty  ;  that  last  relic  of  absolutistic  absurd- 
ity,— moralism  ?  and  why  is  its  correlative, — opinionism 

*  I  wish  it  to  be  particularly  observed,  that  I  give  the  term  "  infidels," 
a  much  more  extended  sense  than  that  which  it  is  popularly  supposed  to  con- 
vey. 


PERIOD  THIRD.  25 

still  the  basis  of  your  political  system  ?  Why  are  you,  like 
your  opponents,  still  appealing  to  that  most  fallible  of  all 
guides, — conscience  ?  And  in  the  name  of  all  that  is  intelli- 
gible, what  good  is  there  in  that  chronic  suicide  which  you 
outdo  even  supernaturalists  in  lauding  as  virtue  ?  Besides, 
has  '  virtue,'  notwithstanding  all  the  pains  taken  with  it,  and 
all  the  hot-house  fostering  that  that  plant  has  received,  grown 
a  hair's  breadth  since  the  remotest  ages  ? 

"  Why  has  not  how  to,  long  since  superseded  ought  to  ? 

"Abandon,  I  beseech  you,  that  inflicter  of  martyrdom  ; 
that  watchword  of  Robespierre,  and  of  the  most  relentless 
tyrants  that  ever  tortured  humanity, — principle.  Let  the 
science  and  art  of  goodness  take  its  place. 

"The  severest  and  most  persistent  scourges  of  the  human 
race  are,  and  ever  have  been,  men  and  women  of  principle. 
They  cannot  be  even  bribed  to  do  right.  Robespierre  was 
par  excellence,  '  the  incorruptible  ;'  and  so  was  Marat. 

"Principle  is  the  very  bed  of  Procrustes.  Principle  is  the 
disguise  in  which  the  '  angel  of  darkness  '  appears  so  like 
an  '  angel  of  light,'  as  to  deceive,  thus  far,  all  but  '  the  very 
elect.'  It  partially  deceived  even  me.  But  I  had  not  your 
means  of  detecting  the  cheat.  In  my  day  it  had  not  been,  as 
it  recently  has  been,  demonstrated  that  man's  will,  aided  by 
the  force  of  all  that  is  intelligible  fully  developed  and  har- 
moniously and  most  advantageously  combined,  is  the  meas- 
ure of  his  power,  and  of  nature's  resources  ;  that  well  doing, 
to  any  extent  worth  naming,  requires  nothing  more,  and 
nothing  less,  than  such  force,  such  development,  and  such  com- 
bination ;  that  to  progress,  there  is  no  obstruction,  even  to 
the  unfriendliness  of  climate,  which  is  not,  through  human  art, 
working  with,  in,  and  through  nature,  removeable. 

"In  my  time,  it  had  not  been  shown  (as  it  recently  has 
been,  to  a  mathematical  demonstration)  that  the  only  possi- 
ble way  to  make  people  good,  is  to  create  the  requisite  ma- 
terialistic conditions  ;  and  that  therefore  the  most  stupid  of 
blunders — the  most  infernal  of  cruelties  is  punishment. 

"You  affect  to  love  science.  Make  it  loveable.  Raise  it 
to  the  dignity  of  the  highest  law,  or  religion  ;  make  it  the 
basis  of  government ;  and  thus  avail  yourselves  of  its  whole 
use,  instead  of  the  little  benefit  you  derive  from  its  '  beggarly 
elements.' 

"Patiently  discover,  instead  of  recklessly  and  vainly  'en- 
acting '  laws  ;  scientifically  develop,  and  artistically  combine 
the  whole  force  of  physical  nature,  and  the  whole  power  of 

a 


26  LIFE   OP  THOMAS  PAINE. 

man.  Assist  nature,  whose  head  you  are,  to  create,  till  supply 
is  adequate  to  demand ;  till  creation  is  complete ;  till  har- 
mony is  in  exact  proportion  to  present  antagonism ;  till  no 
obstacle  stands  between  man ,  and  perfect  goodness,  perfect 
freedom,  and  perfect  and  sufficiently  lasting  happiness. 
Thus,  alone,  can  you  eliminate  that  synonym  for  ignorance, — 
mystery — and  its  resulting  '  vice,'  '  virtue/  moralism,  abso- 
lutism, demagogism,  slavery,  and  misery. 

"  If  you  love,  and  would  truly  honor  me,  act  forward,  ac- 
cording to  the  spirit,  and  not  backward,  according  to  the  kt- 
ter,  of  what  I  taught.  Let  onward  to  perfection,  be  your 
motto. 

"Your  numbers  are  sufficient,  as  you  would  see  if  you  would 
but  stand  out ;  you  are  far  from  poor,  on  the  average,  and 
you  include  nearly  all  the  learned  and  scientific  ;  but  you  are 
somehow  or  other  so  averse  to  organizing  and  becoming  an 
efficient  body,  with  a  head,  that  like  the  mutually  suspicious 
eighty-seven  millions  of  Indians,  to  whom  a  few  well  regulated 
British  troops  dictate  terms,  you  suffer  your  even  half  organ- 
ized foes  to  trample  your  rights  under  foot,  when  if  you  would 
organize  on  an  intelligible,  TRULY  selfish,  scientific  and  ar- 
tistic basis,  your  own  rights,  and  those  of  all  your  fellow- 
men  would  be  secured.  Down  with  that  barricade  of  hypo- 
crisy,— principle.  Liberty,  goodness,  in  short,  happiness,  can 
be  nothing  less  than  the  crowning  art. 

''Instead  of  admitting,  as  you  do,  that  nature  ought  to  have 
a  supernatural  guardian  or  kelper,  (inasmuch  as  you  admit 
that  she  is  incompetent  to  supply  more  than  a  tithe  of  the 
satisfaction  which  her  wants,  as  manifested  through  her  high- 
est organism,  man  call  for,)  why  do  you  not  meet  the  question, 
as  it  alone  can  be  met,  by  demonstrating  that  man  no  more 
really  wants  or  needs  absolutely  eternal  self-consciousness, 
than  the  infant  really  wants  or  needs  the  moon  for  a  bauble, 
when  he  stretches  forth  his  hand  to  grasp  it,  and  weeps  at  his 
failure.  But  that  what  man  really  does  want,  nature,  through 
science,  art,  development,  can  give  ?  Can't  you  see  that  what 
man  in  reality  means  by  perfect  and  '  eternal '  happiness,  is, 
perfect  and  sufficiently-lasting  happiness?  and  that  nature 
must  furnish  this,  or  prove  a  failure  which  would  amount  to 
a  greater  absurdity,  than  '  supernaturalism }  itself?  Do  you 
not  see  that  for  man  to  even  desire  any  thing  reaUy  beyond 
nature,  is  to  prove  '  supernaturalism.'  Mind,  I  have  said  de- 
sire ;  for  man  cannot  conceive  of,  and  therefore  cannot  de- 
sire the  annihilation  of  duration  and  space.  He  cannot  really 


PERIOD  THIRD.  M 

wish  for  happiness  without  its  conditions  ;  if  it  came  merely 
at  his  bidding, — if  he  could  believe  himself  into  Heaven,  or 
vote  himself  free,  both  Heaven  and  freedom  would  pall  on  the 
appetite  as  soon  as  tasted. 

"Had  I  lived  at  the  time  when  Humboldt  scanned  nature, 
when  Feuerbach  demonstrated  the  naturalness  of  '  supernatu- 
ralism,'  and  showed  the  all-importance  and  practiced  signifi- 
cancy  of  man's  instinctively  inaugurating  his  abstract  subject- 
ivity almighty,  when  Comte  showed  the  connection,  and 
proved  the  unity  of  all  science,  when  Fourier  discovered  the 
equitable  relations  which  should  exist  between  labor,  capital, 
and  skill,  and  which,  sooner  or  later,  must  displace  the  pres- 
ent unnatural  and  ruinous  ones  ;  had  I  lived  when  it  had 
been  demonstrated  that  nature  is  all  sufficient ;  that  science, 
art, — development,  well  prove  adequate  to  all  the  require- 
ments of  miracle  ;  that  the  highest  aspirations  of  nature's 
highest  organism,  man,  indicate  the  perfection  to  which  na- 
ture is  spontaneously  tending,  and  which  she  must  attain  to  ; 
that  the  business  of  man  is  to  discover  how  to  fully  gratify, 
aU  the  passions  which  nature  has  implanted  in  him ;  (instead 
of  trying  to  contrive  how  to  mortify,  repress,  and  overcome 
nearly  all,  and  by  far  the  best  of  them,)  how  to  live,  till  he 
has  rung,  so  to  speak,  all  the  changes  possible  on  his  five 
senses,  till  the  repetition  becomes  irksome  ;  had  I  enjoyed 
the  advantages  derivable  from  all  this,  your  steam  engines, 
steam  printing  presses,  sewing  machines,  and  all  other  ma- 
chines, and  your  electric  telegraph,  even,  should  have  had  its 
match  in  social  science  and  art ;  you  should,  by  this  time, 
have  had  a  religion  self  evidently  true,  and  a  system  of  law 
necessarily  just ;  and  the  whole  world  should  have  been  far 
advanced  towards  becoming  a  state  spontaneously  free." 

Reader,  considering  how  very  far  ahead  of  his  time,  it 
was  the  distinguishing  characteristic  of  the  author  of  the 
"  Rights  of  Man"  and  "  The  Age  of  Reason"  to  be,  is  it  too 
much  to  suppose  that,  were  he  alive  now,  he  would  talk  thus, 
except  far  more  eloquently,  beyond  all  question?  Would 
not  he  who  made  but  two  steps  from  the  government  of 
priests,  kings  and  lords,  to  the  people's  right  to  be  their  own 
church  and  their  own  government,  have  found  out,  before 
now,  the  means  of  escaping  from  demagogism  ?  As  one  who 
is  not  prepared  to  admit  that  liberty  is  an  empty  name,  that 
happiness  at  all  answering  to  that  which  man  desires,  is  an 
impractibility,  I  respectfully  submit  that  he  would.  And  I 
scorn  the  supposition  that  he  would  degrade  himself,  and  the 


"28  LIFE   OP   THOMAS  PAINE, 

cause  lie  espoused,  so  far  as  to  make  the  pitiable  and  lying 
excuse  which  the  betrayers  of  mankind  offer  in  behalf  of 
"  free  institutions," —  that  they  are  no  worse  than  those,  to 
escape  from  which,  both  earth  and  ocean  have  been  reddened 
with  human  blood,  and  strewn  with  the  ashes  and  the  wrecks 
of  human  industry.  Our  "  free  institutions  "  have  come  to  be 
so  much  worse  than  those  confessedly  despotic,  that  it  is  only 
the  superior  natural  advantage,  which  our  country  enjoys, 
that  has  thus  far  preserved  even  their  name. 

The  proper  or  natural  functions  of  popularism  are  but 
transitional.  The  instant  it  is  undertaken  to  erect  democracy 
into  a  permanency,  it  dwindles  to  a  most  pitiable  imitation — 
to  a  blundering  re-enacting,  under  false  names,  of  the  worn 
out  measures  of  the  religion  and  politics,  from  which  it  is  le- 
gitimately but  a  protest  and  a  departure.  It  thus  becomes  so 
exceedingly  corrupt  and  morbific,  that  the  social  organism, 
to  protect  itself  from  utter  dissolution,  is  forced  to  reject  it, 
and  return  again  under  its  old  regime.  And  nothing  short 
of  the  religion  and  government  of  science  can  furnish  an  out- 
let from  this  vicious  circle. 

Mr.  Paine  again  left  France  for  England,  in  Nov.  1790, 
having  witnessed  the  destruction  of  the  Bastile,  and  been  an 
attentive  observer,  if  not  an  active  adviser,  of  the  revolution- 
ary proceedings  which  had  taken  place  during  the  preceding 
twelve  months. 

On  the  13th  of  March,  1791,  Mr.  Jordan,  No.  166  Fleet- 
street,  published  for  him  the  first  part  of  "  The  Rights  of 
Man."  This  work  was  intended  to  arouse  the  people  of  Eng- 
land to  a  sense  of  the  defects  and  abuses  of  their  vaunted 
system  of  government ;  besides  which,  it  was  a  masterly  re- 
futation of  the  falsehoods  and  exaggerations  of  Edmund 
Burke's  celebrated  "Reflections  on  The  Revolution  in 
France." 

About  the  middle  of  May,  Mr.  Paine  again  went  to 
France.  This  was  just  before  the  king  attempted  to  escape 
from  his  own  dominions.  On  the  occasion  of  the  return  of  the 
fugitive  monarch,  Mr.  Paine  was,  from  an  accidental  circum- 
stance, in  considerable  danger  of  losing  his  life.  An  immense 
concourse  of  people  had  assembled  to  witness  the  event. 
Among  the  crowd  was  Mr.  Paine.  An  officer  proclaimed 
the  order  of  the  national  assembly,  that  all  should  be  silent 
and  covered.  In  an  instant  all  except  Mr.  Paine,  put  on 
their  hats.  He  had  lost  his  cockade,  the  emblem  of  liberty 
and  equality.  The  multitude  observing  that  he  remained 


PERIOD  THIRD.  29 

uncovered,  supposed  that  he  was  one  of  their  enemies,  and  a 
cry  instantly  arose, " Aristocrat  !  Aristocrat  t  a  la  lanteme  ! 
a  la  lanterne  /"  He  was  instructed  by  those  who  stood  near 
him  to  put  on  his  hat,  but  it  was  some  time  before  the  matter 
could  be  satisfactorily  explained  to  the  multitude. 

On  the  13th  of  July,  1791,  he  returned  to  London,  but 
it  was  not  thought  prudent  that  he  should  attend  the  public 
celebration  of  the  French  revolution,  which  was  to  take  place 
on  the  following  day.  He  was  however,  present  at  the  meet- 
ing which  was  held  at  the  Thatched-House  tavern,  on  the 
twentieth  of  August  following.  Of  the  address  and  declara- 
tion which  issued  from  this  meeting,  and  which  was  at  first 
attributed  to  Mr.  Horn  Tooke,  Mr.  Paine  was  the  author. 

Mr.  Paine  was  now  engaged  in  preparing  the  second  part 
of  the ''Rights  of  Man" for  the  press.  In  the  mean  time  the 
ministry  had  received  information  that  the  work  would 
shortly  appear,  and  they  resolved  to  get  it  suppressed  if  pos- 
sible. Having  ascertained  the  name  of  the  printer,  they 
employed  him  to  endeavor  to  purchase  the  copyright.  He 
began  by  offering  a  hundred  guineas,  then  five  hundred,  and 
at  length  a  thousand  ;  but  Mr.  Paine  told  him,  that  he  "would 
never  put  it  in  the  power  of  any  printer  or  publisher  to 
suppress  or  alter  a  work  of  his." 

Finding  that  Mr.  Paine  was  not  to  be  bribed,  the  ministry 
next  attempted  to  suppress  the  work  by  means  of  prosecutions ; 
but  even  in  this  they  succeeded  so  badly,  that  the  second  part 
of  the  "  Rights  of  Man"  was  published  on  the  sixteenth  ol 
February,  1792,  and  -at  a  moderate  calculation,  more  than  a 
hundred  thousand  copies  of  the  work  were  circulated. 

In  August,  1792,  Paine  prepared  a  publication  in  defense 
of  the  "  Rights  of  Man,"  and  of  his  motives  in  writing  it ;  he 
entitled  it  "  An  Address  to  the  Addressers  on  the  late  Proc- 
lamation." "  This,"  says  Sherwin,  "  is  one  of  the  severest 
pieces  of  satire  that  ever  issued  from  the  press." 

About  the  middle  of  September,  1792,  a  French  deputa- 
tion announced  to  Mr.  Paine  that  he  had  been  elected  to  re- 
present the  department  of  Calais  in  the  National  Convention. 

At  Dover,  whither  he  repaired,  in  order  to  embark  for 
France,  the  treatment  of  the  minions  of  British  despotism 
towards  the  hated  author  of  the  "  Rights  of  Man,"  was  dis- 
graceful and  mean  to  the  last  degree.  Plis  trunks  were  all 
opened,  and  the  contents  examined.  Some  of  his  papers  were 
seized,  and  it  is  probable  that  the  whole  would  have  been 
but  for  the  cool  and  steady  conduct  of  their  owner  and  hia 


30  LIFE   OF   THOMAS  PAINE. 

attendants.  When  the  custom-house  officers  had  indulged  their 
petty  malice  as  long  as  they  thought  proper,  Mr.  Paine  and  hia 
friends  were  allowed  to  embark,  and  they  arrived  at  Calais  in 
about  three  hours.  The  English-French  representative,  how- 
ever, very  narrowly  escaped  the  vigilance  of  the  despots  he  had 
provoked,  for  it  appears  that  an  order  to  detain  him  was  re- 
ceived at  Dover,  in  about  twenty  minutes  after  his  embarkation. 

A  salute  from  the  battery  announced  to  the  people  of 
Calais  the  arrival  of  the  distinguished  foreigner,  on  whom 
they  had  bestowed  an  honor  unprecedented. 

His  reception,  both  military  and  civic,  was  what  a  mon- 
arch might  well  have  been  proud  of.  "  The  garrison  at 
Calais  were  under  arms  to  receive  this  friend  of  liberty  ;  the 
tri-colored  cockade  was  presented  to  him  by  the  mayor,  and 
the  handsomest  woman  in  the  town  was  selected  to  place  it 
on  his  hat."* 

This  ceremony  being  over,  he  walked  to  Deissein's  in  the 
Hue,  de  VEgalite  (formerly  Rue  dc  fioi),  the  men,  women,  and 
children,  crowding  around- him,  and  shouting"  Vive  Thomas 
Paine  !'*'  He  was  then  conducted  to  the  town-hall,  and  there 
presented  to  the  municipality,  who  with  the  greatest  affection 
embraced  their  representative.  The  mayor  addressed  him  in 
a  short  speech  (which  was  interpreted  to  him  by  his  friend 
M.  Audibert),  to  which  Mr.  Paine,  laying  his  hand  on  his 
heart,  replied,  that  his  life  should  be  devoted  to  their  service. 

At  the  inn  he  was  waited  upon  by  the  authorities,  and  by 
the  president  of  the  Constitutional  society,  who  desired  that 
he  would  attend  their  meeting  that  night :  he  cheerfully  com- 
plied with  the  request,  and  the  whole  town  would  have  been 
there.,  had  there  been  room  :  the  hall  of  the  Hinimes  was  so 
crowded  that  it  was  with  the  greatest  difficulty  they  made  way 
for  Mr.  Paine  to  the  side  of  the  president.  Over  the  chair  in 
which  he  sat  were  placed  the  bust  of  Mirabeau,  and  the  colors  of 
France,  England,  and  America  united.  A  speaker  from  the 
tribune,  formally  announced  his  election,  amid  the  plaudits  of 
the  people ;  for  some  minutes  after  nothing  was  heard  but 

*  The  least  unfair  view  of  Thomas  Paine's  character  and  merits  which 
has  hitherto  been  found  in  the  -'historical  writings  of  any  American  author 
except  Randall,  Savage,  and  Vale,  (who  quotes  copiously  from  Sherwin), 
is  taken  by  an  ecclesiastic,  Francis  L.  Hawkes,  D.D.,  L.L.D.  His  "  Cy- 
clopedia of  Biography,"  from  which  1  have  quoted  above,  is  published  by 
the  Messrs.  D.  Appleton  &  Co.,  who  also  publish  Buckle's"  History  of 
Civilization  in  England  ;"  a  work  which  would  have  fully  satisfied  the  author 
of  the  "  Age  of  Reason"  himself,  had  he  lived  to  read  it. 


PERIOD   THIRD  31 

"  Five  la  Nation  I  Vive  Thomas  Paine,"  in  voices  both  male 
and  female. 

On  the  following  day  an  extra  meeting  was  appointed  to 
be  held  in  the  church  in  honor  of  the  new  deputy  to  the  con- 
vention, the  Minimes  having  been  found  quite  suffocating, 
from  the  vast  concourse  of  people  which  had  assembled,  on 
the  previous  occasion.  At  the  theatre,  on  the  evening  after 
his  arrival,  a  box  was  specially  reserved  for  the  author  of  the 
"  Rights  of  Man,"  the  object  of  the  English  proclamation. 

Such  was  the  enthusiasm  of  the  people  for  the  "  author- 
hero"  of  the  American  Revolution,  that  Mr.  Paine  was  also 
elected  deputy  for  Abbeville,  Beauvais,  and  Versailles  ;  but 
the  people  of  Calais  having  been  beforehand  in  their  choice, 
he  preferred  being  their  representative. 

After  remaining  with  his  constituents  a  short  time,  he 
proceeded  to  Paris,  in  order  to  take  his  seat  as  a  member  of 
the  National  Assembly.  On  the  road  thither  he  met  with 
similar  honors  to  those  which  he  had  received  at  Calais.  As 
soon  as  he  arrived  at  Paris,  he  addressed  a  letter  to  his  fel- 
low-citizens, the  people  of  Prance,  thanking  th^m  for  both 
adopting  and  electing  him  as  their  deputy  to  the  convention. 

Mr.  Paine  was  shortly  after  his  arrival  in  Paris,  appointed 
a  member  of  the  committee  for  framing  the  new  constitution. 
While  he  was  performing  the  important  duties  of  his  station, 
the  ministry  of  England  were  using  every  effort  to  counteract 
the  (to  them)  dangerous  principles  which  he  had  disseminated. 
For  this  purpose  ttiey  filed  informations. against  the  different 
individuals  who  had  sold  the  "Rights  of  Man,"  and  also 
against  the  author.  The  trial  of  Mr.  Paine  came  on  at 
Guildhall,  on  the  18th  of  December,  before  that  most  cruel 
and  vindictive  of  creatures  that  ever  disgraced  the  bench  of 
even  a  British  court  of  justice,  Lord  Kenyon.  As  the  judge 
was  pensioned,  and  the  jury  packed,  a  verdict  of  guilty  follow- 
ed as  a  matter  of  course. 

Mr.  Erskine's  plea  for  the  defence  was,  as  Mr.  Paine 
observed,  on  reading  a  report  of  the  farce  which  had  been 
enacted  under  the  name  of  a  trial,  "  a  good  speech  for  himself 
but  a  very  poor  defence  of  the  "  Rights  of  Man"* 

Seldom  has  the  cowardice  which  a  sense  of  guilt  excites, 
reached  such  a  panic  as  that  into  which  the  government  of 

*  "  Paine's  work,"  [the  "  Rights  of  Man,"]  says  Schlosser,  in  bis  "  History  of 
The  Eighteenth  Century,"  "  made  as  great  and  as  lasting  an  impression  on 
certain  classes  in  England  as  Burke's  did  upon  the  great  majority  of  tin.* 
higher  and  middle  ranks." 


32  LIFE   OF  THOMAS   PAINE. 

England  was  thrown  by  Thomas  Paine.  In  France  h  v  was 
safe  from  their  malice,  but  no  less  than  ten  individuals  were 
prosecuted  for  selling  his  works,  and  by  corrupted  judges  and 
packed  juries,  nine  of  the  number  were  convicted,  and  severely 
fined  or  imprisoned,  or  both. 

"On  the  first  appearance  of  the  '  Rights  of  Man,"''  say? 
Sherwin,  the  ministry  saw  that  it  inculcated  truths  which  they 
could  not  controvert;  that  it  contained  plans,  which,  if 
adopted,  would  benefit  at  least  nine  tenths  of  the  community, 
and  that  its  principles  were  the  reverse  of  the  existing  sys- 
tem of  government ;  they  therefore  judged  that  the  most 
politic  method  would  be  to  treat  the  work  with  contempt, 
to  represent  it  as  a  foolish  and  insignificant  performance, 
unworthy  of  their  notice,  and  undeserving  the  attention 
of  the  public.  But  they  soon  found  the  inefficiency  of  this 
mode  of  treatment ;  the  more  contempt  they  showed,  the 
more  the  book  was  read,  and  approved  of.  Finding,  there- 
fore, that  their  declarations  of  contempt  were  as  unsuccessful 
as  their  project  of  buying  up  the  work,  they  determined  upon 
prosecuting  the  author  and  publisher.  Mr.  Paine  was  not  at 
all  surprised  at  this  resolution  of  the  ministry ;  indeed, 
he  had  anticipated  it  on  the  publication  of  the  second  part 
of  the  work,  and  to  remove  any  doubt  as  to  his  intention  of 
defending  the  principles  which  he  had  so  effectually  incul- 
cated, he  addressed  the  following  letter  to  his  publisher  : — 

FEBKUARY  16,  1792. 

SIR  :  Should  any  person,  under  the  sanction  of  any  kind  of 
authority,  inquire  of  you  respecting  the  author  and  publisher 
of  the  "  Rights  of  Man,"  you  will  please  to  mention  me  as  the 
author  and  publisher  of  that  work,  and  show  to  such  person 
this  letter.  I  will,  as  soon  as  I  am  made  acquainted  with  it, 
appear  and  answer  for  the  work  personally. 

Your  humble  servant, 

THOMAS  PAINE. 

MR.  JORDAN, 
No.  166  Fleet  Street. 

"  The  first  intimation  which  Mr.  Paine  received,"  continues 
Sherwin,  "  of  the  intentions  of  the  ministry,  was  on  the  14th 
of  May,  1792.  He  was  then  at  Bromly,  in  Kent,  upon  which 
lie  came  immediately  to  town  ;  on  his  arrival  he  found  that 
Mr.  Jordan  had  that  evening  been  served  with  a  summons  to 
appear  at  the  court  of  King's  Bench  on  the  Monday  following, 
but  for  what  purpose  was  not  stated.  Conceiving  it  to  be  on 


PERIOD   THIRD.  33 

account  of  the  work,  he  appointed  a  meeting  with  Mr.  Jordan, 
on  the  next  morning,  when  he  provided  a  solicitor,  and  took 
the  expense  of  the  defense  on  himself.  But  Mr.  Jordan, 
it  appears,  had  too  much  regard  for  his  person  to  hazard  its 
safety  on  the  event  of  a  prosecution,  and  he  compromised  the 
affair  with  a  solicitor  of  the  treasury,  by  agreeing  to  appear 
in  court  and  plead  guilty.  This  arrangement  answered  the 
purpose  of  both  parties — That  of  Jordan  in  liberating  himself 
from  the  risk  of  a  prosecution,  and  that  of  the  ministry,  since 
his  plea  of  guilty  amounted  in  some  measure  to  a  condemna- 
tion of  the  work." 

The  following  letter  from  Mr.  Paine  to  the  Attorney-Gen- 
eral, Sir  Archibald  Macdonald,  shows,  that  but  for  the  circum- 
stance of  his  being  called  to  France,  as  just  related,  it  was 
his  intention  to  have  formally  defended  himself  in  the 
prosecution  against  him  as  author  of  the  "  Rights  of  Man." 

"  SIR  :  Though  I  have  some  reason  for  believing  that  you 
were  not  the  original  promoter  or  encourager  of  the  prosecu- 
tion commenced  against  the  work  entitled  "  Rights  of  Man," 
either  as  that  prosecution  is  intended  to  affect  the  author,  the 
publisher,  or  the  public  ;  yet  as  you  appear  the  official  person 
therein,  I  address  this  letter  to  you,  not  as  Sir  Archibald 
Macdonald,  but  as  attorney-general. 

You  began  by  a  prosecution  against  the  publisher,  Jordan, 
and  the  reason  assigned  by  Mr.  Secretary  Dundas,  in  the 
house  of  commons,  in  the  debate  on  the  proclamation,  May  25, 
for  taking  that  measure,  was,  he  said,  because  Mr.  Paine 
could  not  be  found,  or  words  to  that  effect.  Mr.  Paine,  sir, 
so  far  from  secreting  himself,  never  went  a  step  out  of 
his  way,  nor  in  the  least  instance  varied  from  his  usual 
conduct,  to  avoid  any  measure  you  might  choose  to  adopt 
with  respect  to  him.  It  is  on  the  purity  of  his  heart,  and  the 
universal  utility  of  the  principles  and  plans  which  his  writings 
contain,  that  he  rests  the  issue  ;  and  he  will  not  dishonor  it 
by  any  kind  of  subterfuge.  The  apartments  which  he  occu- 
pied at  the  time  of  writing  the  work  last  winter,  he  has  con- 
tinued to  occupy  to  the  present  hour,  and  the  solicitors  of  the 
prosecution  know  where  to  find  him  ;  of  which  there  is 
a  proof  in  their  own  office  as  far  back  as  the  21st  of  May, 
and  also  in  the  office  of  my  own  attorney. 

But  admitting,  for  the  sake  of  the  case,  that  the  reason 
for  proceeding  against  the  publisher  was,  as  Mr.  Dundas 
stated,  that  Mr.  Paine  could  not  be  found,  that  reason  can 
now  exist  no  longer. 


34  LIFE   OF  THOMAS   PAINE. 

The  instant  that  I  was  informed  that  an  information  was 
preparing  to  be  filed  against  ine,  as  the  author  of,  I  believe, 
one  of  the  most  useful  books  ever  offered  to  mankind,  I 
directed  my  attorney  to  put  in  an  appearance  ;  and  as  I 
shall  meet  the  prosecution  fully  and  fairly,  and  with  a  good 
and  upright  conscience,  I  have  a  right  to  expect  that  no  act 
of  littleness,  will  be  made  use  of  on  the  part  of  the  prosecu- 
tion toward  influencing  the  future  issue  with  respect  to  the 
author.  This  expression  may,  perhaps,  appear  obscure  to 
you ,  but  I  am  in  the  possession  of  some  matters  which  serve 
to  show  that  the  action  against  the  publisher  is  not  intended 
to  be  a  real  action.  If,  therefore,  any  persons  concerned  in 
the  prosecution  have  found  their  cause  so  weak  as  to  make  it 
appear  convenient  to  them  to  enter  into  a  negotiation  with 
the  publisher,  whether  for  the  purpose  of  his  submitting  to  a 
verdict,  and  to  make  use  of  the  verdict  so  obtained  as  a  cir- 
cumstance, by  way  of  precedent,  on  a  future  trial  against  my- 
self ;  or  for  any  other  purpose  not  fully  made  known  to  me  ; 
if,  I  say,  I  have  cause  to  suspect  this  to  be  the  case,  I  shall 
most  certainly  -withdraw  the  defence  I  should  otherwise  have 
made,  or  promoted,  on  his  (the  publisher's)  behalf,  and  leave 
the  negotiators  to  themselves,  and  shall  reserve  the  whole 
of  the  defence  for  the  real  trial. 

But,  sir,  for  the  purpose  of  conducting  this  matter  with  at 
least  that  appearance  of  fairness  and  openness  that  shall  just- 
ify itself  before  the  public  whose  cause  it  really  is  (for  it  is 
the  right  of  public  discussion  and  investigation  that  is 
questioned),  I  have  to  propose  to  you  to  cease  the  prosecu- 
tion against  the  publisher  ;  and  as  the  reason  or  pretext  can 
no  longer  exist  for  continuing  it  against  him  because  Mr. 
Paine  could  not  be  found,  that  you  would  direct  the  whole 
process  against  me,  with  whom  the  prosecuting  party  will  not 
find  it  possible  to  enter  into  any  private  negotiation. 

I  will  do  the  cause  full  justice,  as  well  for  the  sake  of  the 
nation,  as  for  my  own  reputation. 

Another  reason  for  discontinuing  the  process  against  the 
publisher  is,  because  it  can  amount  to  nothing.  First,  be- 
cause a  jury  in  London  cannot  decide  upon  the  fact  of 
publishing  beyond  the  limits  of  the  jurisdiction  of  London, 
and  therefore  the  work  may  be  republished  over  and  over  again 
in  every  county  in  the  nation  and  every  case  must  have 
a  separate  process  ;  and  by  the  time  that  three  or  four  hun- 
dred prosecutions  have  been  had,  the  eyes  of  the  nation  will 
then  be  fully  open  to  see  that  the  work  in  question  contains 


PERIOD   THIRD.  35 

a  plan  the  best  calculated  to  root  out  all  the  abuses  of  govern- 
ment, and  to  lessen  the  taxes  of  the  nation  upwards  of  six 
millions  annually. 

Secondly,  because  though  the  gentlemen  of  London  may 
be  very  expert  in  understanding  their  particular  professions 
and  occupations,  and  how  to  make  business  contracts  with 
government  beneficial  to  themselves  as  individuals,  the  rest 
of  the  nation  may  not  be  disposed  to  consider  them  sufficiently 
qualified  nor  authorized  to  determine  for  the  whole  nation 
on  plans  of  reform,  and  on  systems  and  principles  of  govern- 
ment. This  would  be  in  effect  to  erect  a  jury  into  a  national 
convention,  instead  of  electing  a  convention,  and  to  lay  a 
precedent  for  the  probable  tyranny  of  juries,  under  the  pre- 
tence of  supporting  their  rights. 

That  the  possibility  always  exists  of  packing  juries  will 
not  be  denied  ;  and,  therefore,  in  all  cases  where  government 
is  the  prosecutor,  more  especially  in  those  where  the  right  of 
public  discussion  and  investigation  of  principles  and  systems 
of  government  is  attempted  to  be  suppressed  by  a  verdict,  or 
in  those  where  the  object  ol  the  work  that  is  prosecuted  is 
the  reform  of  abuse  and  the  abolition  of  sinecure  places  and 
pensions,  in  all  these  cases  the  verdict  of  a  jury  will  itself 
become  a  subject  of  discussion  ;  and  therefore,  it  furnishes  an 
additional  reason  for  discontinuing  the  prosecution  against 
the  publisher,  more  especially  as  it  is  not  a  secret  that  there 
has  been  a  negotiation  with  him  for  secret  purposes,  and  for 
proceeding  against  me  only.  I  shall  make  a  much  stronger 
defence  than  what  I  believe  the  treasury  solicitor's  agreement 
with  him  will  permit  him  to  do. 

I  believe  that  Mr.  Burke,  finding  himself  defeated,  and  not 
being  able  to  make  any  answer  to  the  "  Rights  of  Man,"  has 
been  one  of  the  promoters  of  this  prosecution  ;  and  I  shall 
return  the  compliment  to  him  by  showing,  in  a  future  publi- 
cation, that  he  has  been  a  masked  pensioner  at  fifteen  hundred 
pounds  per  annum  for  about  ten  years. 

Thus  it  is  that  the  public  money  is  wasted,  and  the  dread 
of  public  investigation  is  produced. 

I  am,  sir, 

Your  obedient  humble  servant, 
THOMAS  PAINB. 

SIR  A  MACDONALD,  Attorney-General. 

On  the  25th  of  July,  1792,  the  Duke  of  Brunswick  issued 


36  LIFE   OF  THOMAS   PAINE. 

his  sanguinary  manifesto,  in  which  he  declared  that  the  allies 
were  resolved  to  inflict  the  most  dreadful  punishments  on  the 
national  assembly,  for  their  treatment  of  the  royal  family  ; 
he  even  went  so  far  as  to  threaten  to  give  up  Paris  to  mili- 
tary execution.  This  made  the  people  furious,  and  drove 
them  to  deeds  of  desperation.  A  party  was  consequently 
formed  in  the  convention  for  putting  the  king  to  death.  Mr. 
Paine  labored  hard  to  prevent  matters  from  being  carried  to 
this  extremity,  but  though  his  efforts  produced  a  few  converts 
to  his  doctrine,  the  majority  of  his  colleagues  were  too  en- 
raged at  the  duplicity  of  the  king,  and  the  detestable  conduct 
of  the  foreign  monarchs,  with  whom  he  was  leagued,  to  be 
satisfied  with  anything  short  of  the  most  dreadful  vengeance. 
The  conduct  of  Louis  was  too  reprehensible  to  be  passed  over 
unnoticed,  and  Mr.  Paine  therefore  voted  that  he  should  be 
tried  ;  but  when  the  question  whether  he  should  be  put  to 
death,  was  brought  forward,  he  opposed  it  by  every  argu- 
ment in  his  power.  His  exertions  were,  however,  ineffectual, 
and  sentence  of  death  was  passed,  though  by  a  very  small  ma- 
jority. Mr.  Paine  lost  no  opportunity  of  protesting  against 
this  extreme  measure  ;  when  the  question,  whether  the  sen- 
tence should  be  carried  into  execution,  was  discussed,  he 
combated  the  proposition  with  great  energy.  As  he  was  not 
well  versed  in  the  French  language,  he  wrote  or  spoke  in  Eng- 
lish, which  one  of  the  secretaries  translated. 

It  is  evident  that  his  reasoning  was  thought  very  persua- 
sive, since  those  who  had  heard  the  speeches  of  Buzot,  Con- 
dorcet,  and  Brissot,  on  the  same  side  of  the  question,  without 
interruption,  broke  out  in  murmurs,  while  Paine's  opinion 
was  being  translated  ;  and  Marat,  at  length,  losing  all  pa- 
tience, exclaimed  that  Paine  was  a  quaker,  whose  mind  was 
so  contracted  by  the  narrow  principles  of  his  religion,  that 
he  was  incapable  of  the  liberality  that  was  requisite  for  con- 
demning men  to  death.  This  shrewd  argument  not  being 
thought  convincing,  the  secretary  continued  to  read,  that '  the 
execution  of  the  sentence,  instead  of  an  act  of  justice,  would 
appear  to  all  the  world,  and  particularly  to  their  allies,  the 
American  States,  as  an  act  of  vengeance,  and  that  if  he  were 
sufficiently  master  of  the  French  language,  he  would,  in  the 
name  of  his  brethren  of  America,  present  a  petition  at  their 
bar  against  the  execution  of  the  sentence.'  Marat  and  his 
associates  said  that  these  could  not  possibly  be  the  sentiments 
of  Thomas  Paine,  and  that  the  assembly  was  imposed  upon 


PERIOD   THIRD.  37 

by  a  false  translation.     On  comparing  it  with  the  original, 
however,  it  was  found  to  be  correct. 

The  only  practical  effect  of  Paine's  leniency  to  the  king 
was  that  of  rendering  himself  an  object  of  hatred  among  the 
most  violent  and  now  dominant  actors  in  the  revolution. 
They  found  that  he  could  not  be  induced  to  participate  in 
tlioir  acts  of  cruelty  ;  they  dreaded  the  opposition  which  he 
might  make  to  their  sanguinary  deeds,  and  they  therefore 
marked  him  out  as  a  victim  to  be  sacrificed  the  first  oppor- 
tunity. 

The  humanity  of  Mr.  Paine  was,  indeed,  one  of  the  most 
prominent  features  in  his  character,  and  he  exercised  it, 
whether  on  public  or  private  occasions.  Of  his  strict  atten- 
tion to  his  public  duty  in  this  respect,  even  at  the  hazard  of 
his  own  safety,  we  have  just  seen  a  convincing  proof  in  his 
opposition  to  the  execution  of  the  king  ;  and  of  his  humane 
and  charitable  disposition  in  private  matters,  the  following 
circumstances  are  sufficient  to  warrant  the  most  unqualified 
conclusion. 

Mr.  Paine  was  dining  one  day  with  about  twenty  friends, 
at  a  coffee-house  in  the  Palais  Egalite,  now  the  Palais  Royal, 
when,  unfortunately  for  the  harmony  of  the  company,  a  cap- 
tain in  the  English  service  contrived  to  introduce  himself. 
The  military  gentleman  was  a  strenuous  supporter  of  the 
English  system  of  government,  and  of  course,  a  decided  enemy 
of  the  French  Revolution.  After  the  cloth  was  removed,  the 
conversation  turned  on  the  state  of  affairs  in  England,  and 
the  means  which  had  been  adopted  by  the  government  to 
check  political  knowledge.  Mr.  Paine  gave  his  opinion  very 
freely,  and  much  to  the  satisfaction  of  every  one  present,  ex- 
cept Captain  Grimstone,  who  finding  himself  cornered, 
answered  his  arguments  by  calling  him  a  traitor  to  his  coun- 
try, and  applying  to  him  other  terms  equally  opprobious. 
Mr.  Paine  treated  his  abuse  with  much  good  humor,  which 
rendered  the  captain  so  furious,  that  he  struck  him  a  violent 
blow.  But  the  cowardice  of  this  behavior  on  the  part  of  a 
Btout  young  man,  toward  a  person  upward  of  sixty  years  of 
age,  was  not  the  worst  part  of  the  affair.  The  captain  Lad 
struck  a  citizen  deputy  of  the  convention,  which  was  an  in- 
sult to  the  whole  nation  ;  the  offender  was  hurried  into  cus- 
tody, and  it  was  with  the  greatest  difficulty  that  Mr.  Paine 
prevented  him  from  being  massacred  on  the  spot. 

The  convention  had  decreed  the  punishment  of  death  to 
any  one  who  should  be  convicted  of  striking  a  deputy  :  Mr. 


38  LIFE   OF   THOMAS   PAINE. 

Paine  was  therefore  placed  in  a  very  unpleasant  situation. 
He  immediately  applied  to  Barrere,  president  of  the  commit- 
tee of  public  safety,  for  a  passport  for  his  imprudent  adver- 
sary. His  request  being,  after  much  hesitation,  complied 
with,  he  still  had  considerable  difficulty  in  procuring  his  lib- 
eration ;  but  even  this  was  not  all  of  which  the  nobility  of 
his  nature  was  capable.  The  captain  was  without  friends, 
and  penniless  ;  and  Mr.  Paine  generously  supplied  him  with 
money  to  defray  his  travelling  expenses,  home  to  England. 

A  Major  Munroe,  who  lodged  at  the  same  hotel  with  Mr, 
Paine,  and  whose  business  it  was  to  inform  Pitt  and  the  min- 
istry of  England,  of  what  was  going  on  in  France,  remaining 
after  the  war  was  declared,  was  thrown  into  prison.  He 
applied  to  Mr.  Paine,  who,  by  great  exertion,  procured  his 
release. 

The  reign  of  terror  had  now  fairly  begun,  and  Mr.  Paine's 
humane  disposition  conspicuously  marked  him  for  one  of  its 
victims. 

In  allusion  to  the  dreadful  proceedings  which  were  making 
such  havoc  among  the  best  patriots  of  Prance,  he  says  : — 

"  As  for  myself,  I  used  to  find  some  relief  by  walking  alone 
in  the  garden  after  it  was  dark,  and  cursing  with  hearty  good 
will  the  authors  of  that  terrible  system  that  had  turned  the 
character  of  the  revolution  I  had  been  proud  to  defend. 

"I  went  but  little  to  the  convention,  and  then  only  to  make 
my  appearance  ;  because  I  found  it  impossible  for  me  to  join 
in  their  tremendous  decrees,  and  useless  and  dangerous  to 
oppose  them.  My  having  voted  and  spoken  extensively,  more 
so  than  any  other  member,  against  the  execution  of  the  king, 
had  already  fixed  a  mark  upon  me  :  neither  dared  any  of  my 
associates  in  the  convention  to  translate,  and  speak  in  French 
for  me  anything  I  might  have  dared  to  write.  Pen  and  ink 
were  then  of  no  use  to  me.  No  good  could  be  done  by 
writing,  and  no  printer  dared  to  print ;  and  whatever  I 
might  have  written  for  my  private  amusement,  as  anecdotes 
of  the  times,  would  have  been  continually  exposed  to  be  ex- 
amined, and  tortured  into  any  meaning  that  the  rage  of  party 
might  fix  upon  it ;  and  as  to  softer  subjects,  my  heart  was  in 
distress  at  the  fate  of  my  friends,  and  my  harp  was  hung 
upon  the  weeping  willows." 

But  the  gentle,  conciliating,  and  open  manner  of  Mr. 
Paine  rendered  it  impossible  to  impeach  his  political  conduct, 
and  this  was  the  reason  why  he  remained  so  long  at  liberty. 
The  first  attempt  that  was  made  against  him,  was  by  means 


PERIOD  THIRD.  39 

of  an  act  of  the  convention,  which  decreed  that  all  persons 
residing  in  France,  who  were  born  in  England,  should  be 
imprisoned  ;  but  as  Mr.  Paine  was  a  member  of  the  conven- 
tion, and  had  been  adopted  a  "citizen  of  France  "the  decree 
did  not  extend  to  him.  A  motion  was  afterward  made  by 
Bourdon  de  1'Oise,  for  expelling  all  foreigners  from  the  con- 
vention. It  was  evident  from  the  speech  of  the  mover,  that 
Mr.  Paine  was  the  principal  object  aimed  at,  and  as  soon  as 
the  expulsion  was  effected,  an  application  was  made  to  the 
two  committees  of  public  safety,  of  which  Robespierre  was 
the  dictator,  and  he  was  immediately  arrested  under  the  for- 
mer decree  for  imprisoning  persons  born  in  England.  On 
his  way  to  the  Luxembourg,  he  contrived  to  call  upon  his  in- 
timate friend  and  associate,  Joel  Barlow,  with  whom  he  left 
the  manuscript  of  the  first  part  of  the  "Age  of  Reason." 
This  work  he  intended  to  be  the  last  of  his  life,  but  the  pro- 
ceedings in  France,  during  the  year  1793,  induced  him  to  de- 
lay it  no  longer. 

At  the  time  when  the  "  Age  of  Reason "  was  written, 
Mr.  Paine  was  in  daily  expectation  of  being  sent  to  the 
guillotine,  where  many  of  his  friends  had  already  perished  ; 
the  doctrines,  therefore,  which  it  inculcates,  must  be  regarded 
as  the  sentiments  of  a  dying  man.  This  is  a  conclusive  proof 
that  the  work  was  not  the  result  of  a  wish  to  deceive.  Mr. 
Paine  had  measured  his  time  with  such  precision,  that  he  had 
not  finished  the  book  more  than  six  hours,  before  he  was  ar- 
rested and  conveyed  to  the  Luxembourg. 

Had  such  a  singularly  favorable  coincidence  as  this  hap- 
pened in  the  transactions  of  a  Christian  theological  writer, 
it  would  undoubtedly  have  been  ascribed  to  the  interposition 
of  Divine  Providence. 

After  Mr.  Paine  had  remained  in  prison  about  three  weeks, 
the  Americans  residing  in  Paris,  went  in  a  body  to  the  con- 
vention and  demanded  the  liberation  of  their  fellow-citizen. 
The  following  is  a  copy  of  the  address  presented  by  them  to 
the  president  of  the  convention ;  an  address  which  sufficiently 
shows  the  high  estimation  in  which  Mr.  Paine  was  at  thia 
time  held  by  the  citizens  of  the  United  States  : — 

"Citizens!  The  French  nation  had  invited  the  most 
illustrious  of  all  foreign  nations  to  the  honor  of  representing 
her. 

Thomas  Paine,  the  apostle  of  liberty  in  America,  a  pro- 
found and  valuable  philosopher,  a  virtuous  and  esteemed  oiti 
oen,  came  to  France  and  took  a  seat  among  you.  Particular 


40  LIFE   OF  THOMAS   PAINE. 

circumstances  rendered  necessary  the  decree  to  put  under  ar- 
rest all  the  English  residing  in  France. 

"Citizens  !  Representatives  !  We  come  to  demand  of  you 
Thomas  Paine,  in  the  name  of  the  friends  of  liberty,  and  in 
the  name  of  the  Americans,  your  brothers  and  allies  ;  was 
there  anything  more  wanted  to  obtain  our  demand  we  would 
tell  you.  Do  not  give  to  the  leagued  despots  the  pleasure  of 
seeing  Paine  in  irons.  We  inform  you  that  the  seals  put 
upon  the  papers  of  Thomas  Paine  have  been  taken  off,  that 
the  committee  of  general  safety  examined  them,  and  far  from 
finding  among  them  any  dangerous  propositions,  they  only 
found  the  love  of  liberty  which  characterized  him  all  his  life- 
time, that  eloquence  of  nature  and  philosophy  which  made 
him  the  friend  of  mankind,  and  those  principles  of  public 
morality  which  merited  the  hatred  of  kings,  and  the  affection 
of  his  fellow-citizens. 

"In  short,  citizens!  if  you  permit  us  to  restore  Thomas 
Paine  to  the  embraces  of  his  fellow-citizens,  we  offer  to  pledge 
ourselves  as  securities  for  his  conduct  during  the  short  time 
he  shall  remain  in  France." 

The  Americans  who  presented  the  foregoing  address,  re- 
ceived for  answer,  that  '  Mr.  Paine  was  born  in  England/ 
and  it  was  also  hinted  to  them  that  their  attempt  to  reclaim 
him  as  a  citizen  of  the  United  States,  conld  not  be  listened 
to,  in  consequence  of  its  not  being  authorized  by  the  American 
government. 

I  wish  the  reader  to  particularly  note  what  I  have  here 
italicised,  as  I  shall  hereafter  refer  to  it  in  a  very  important 
connection. 

Soon  after  this,  all  communication  between  the  prisoners 
and  their  friends  was  cut  off,  by  an  order  of  the  police  ;  and 
the  only  hope  that  during  six  months,  remained  to  Mr.  Paine, 
was,  that  the  American  minister  would  be  authorized  to  in- 
quire into  the  cause  of  his  imprisonment.  '  But  even  this 
hope,'  Mr.  Paine  observes,  '  in  the  state  in  which  matters  were 
daily  arriving,  was  too  remote  to  have  any  consolatory  effect ; 
and  I  contented  myself  with  the  thought  that  I  might  be  re- 
membered when  it  would  be  too  late.' 

During  this  long  imprisonment  he  amused  himself  by 
writing  a  variety  of  pieces,  both  in  poetry  and  prose,  some 
of  which  have  since  been  published.  He  also  wrote  a  con- 
siderable portion  of  the  second  part  of  the  '  Age  of  Reason.' 

When  he  had  been  in  prison  about  eight  months,  he  was 
seized  with  a  violent  fever,  which  nearly  deprived  him  of 


PERIOD   THIRD.  41 

life,  and  from  the  effects  of  which  he  never  perfectly  re- 
covered. This  fever,  which  rendered  him  insensible  for  more 
than  a  month,  was,  however,  the  means  of  preserving  his  life ; 
for  had  he  remained  in  health,  he  would  no  doubt  have  been 
dragged  before  the  tribunal,  and  sent  to  the  guillotine. 

After  the  fall  of  Robespierre,  Mr.  Paine,  seeing  several 
of  his  fellow-prisoners  set  at  liberty,  began  to  conceive  hopes 
of  his  own  release,  and  addressed  a  memorial  to  Mr.  Monroe, 
the  American  minister,  on  the  subject. 

The  following  is  a  copy  of  Mr.  Monroe's  letter  to  Mr. 
Paine  on  this  occasion : — 

PARIS,  September  18,  1794. 
"  DEAR  SIR  : 

I  was  favored,  soon  after  my  arrival  here,  with  several 
letters  from  you,  and  more  latterly  \*  ith  one  in  the  character 
of  a  memorial  upon  the  subject  of  your  confinement :  and 
should  have  answered  them  at  the  times  they  were  respec- 
tively written,  had  I  not  concluded,  you  would  have  calcula- 
ted with  certainty  upon  the  deep  interest  I  take  in  your  wel- 
fare, and  the  pleasure  with  which  I  shall  embrace  every  op- 
portunity in  my  power  to  serve  you.  I  should  still  pursue 
the  same  course,  and  for  reasons  which  must  obviously  occur, 
if  I  did  not  find  that  you  are  disquieted  with  apprehensions 
upon  interesting  points,  and  which  justice  to  you  and  our 
country  equally  forbid  you  should  entertain.  You  mention 
that  you  have  been  informed  you  are  not  considered  as  an 
American  citizen  by  the  Americans,  and  that  you  have  like- 
wise heard  that  I  had  no  instructions  respecting  you  by  the 
government.  I  doubt  not  the  person  who  gave  you  the  infor- 
mation meant  well,  but  I  suspect  he  did  not  even  convey 
accurately  his  own  ideas  on  the  first  point :  for  I  presume  the 
most  he  could  say  is,  that  you  had  likewise  become  a  French 
citizen,  and  which  by  no  means  deprives  you  of  being  an 
American  one.  Even  this,  however,  may  be  doubted,  I  mean 
the  acquisition  of  citizenship  in  France,  and  I  confess  you 
have  said  much  to  show  that  it  has  not  been  made.  I  really 
suspect  that  this  was  all  that  the  gentleman  who  wrote  to  you, 
and  those  Americans  he  heard  speak  upon  the  subject,  meant. 
It  becomes  my  duty,  however,  to  declare  to  you,  that  I  con- 
sider you  as  an  American  citizen,  and  that  you  are  considered 
universally  in  that  character  by  the  people  of  America.  As 
such  you  are  entitled  to  my  attention  ;  and  so  far  as  it  can  be 
given,  consistently  with  those  obligations  which  are  mutual 


42  LIFE   OF   THOMAS  PAIAJS. 

between  every  government  and  even  transient  passengers,  you 
shall  receive  it. 

The  congress  have  never  decided  upon  the  subject  of  citizen- 
ship, in  a  manner  to  regard  the  present  case.  By  being  with 
us  through  the  revolution,  you  are  of  our  country  as  abso- 
lutely as  if  you  had  been  born  there,  and  you  are  no  more  of 
England  than  every  native  American  is.  This  is  the  true 
doctrine  in  the  present  case,  so  far  as  it  becomes  complicated 
with  any  other  consideration.  I  have  mentioned  it  to  make 
you  easy  upon  the  only  point  which  could  give  you  any  dis- 
quietude. 

It  is  necessary  for  me  to  tell  you,  how  much  all  your  coun- 
trymen— I  speak  of  the  great  mass  of  the  people — are  inter- 
ested in  your  welfare.  They  have  not  forgotten  the  history 
of  their  own  revolution,  and  the  difficult  scenes  through  which 
they  passed  ;  nor  do  they  review  its  several  stages  without 
reviving  in  their  bosoms  a  due  sensibility  of  the  merits  of 
those  who  served  them  in  that  great  and  arduous  conflict. 
The  crime  of  ingratitude  has  not  yet  stained,  and  I  trust 
never  will  stain,  our  national  character.  You  are  considered 
by  them,  as  not  only  having  rendered  important  services  in 
our  own  revolution,  but  as  being,  on  a  more  extensive  scale, 
the  friend  of  human  rights  and  a  distinguished  and  able  ad- 
vocate in  favor  of  public  liberty.  To  the  welfare  of  Thomas 
Paine,  the  Americans  are  not,  nor  can  they  be,  indifferent. 

Of  the  sense  which  the  president  has  always  entertained 
of  your  merits,  and  of  his  friendly  disposition  toward  you, 
you  are  too  well  assured,  to  require  any  declaration  of  it  from 
me.  That  I  forward  his  wishes  in  seeking  your  safety  is  what 
I  well  know  :  and  this  will  form  an  additional  obligation  on 
me  to  perform  what  I  should  otherwise  consider  as  a  duty. 

You  are  in  my  opinion,  at  present,  menaced  by  no  kind  of 
danger.  To  liberate  you  will  be  an  object  of  my  endeavors, 
and  as  soon  as  possible.  But  you  must,  until  that  event  shall 
be  accomplished,  bear  your  situation  with  patience  and  forti- 
tude ;  you  will  likewise  have  the  justice  to  recollect,  that  I 
am  placed  here  upon  a  difficult  theatre,  many  important 
objects  to  attend  to,  and  with  few  to  consult.  It  becomes  me 
in  pursuit  of  those,  so  to  regulate  my  conduct  with  respect  to 
each,  as  to  the  manner  and  the  time,  as  will,  in  my  judgment, 
be  best  calculated  to  accomplish  the  whole. 

With  great  esteem  and  respect  consider  me  personally 
your  friend. 

JAMES  MONBOE.' 


PERIOD   THIRD.  43 

Mr.  Paine  was  released  from  prison  on  the  4th  of  Novem- 
ber, 1794,  having  been  in  confinement  for  eleven  months. 

After  his  liberation,  he  was  kindly  invited  to  the  house  of 
Mr.  Monroe,  where  he  remained  for  about  eighteen  months. 
The  following  extract  from  one  of  his  letters,  written  after 
his  return  to  America,  is  a  highly  interesting  description  of 
his  situation  while  in  prison,  and  of  another  narrrow  escape 
which  he  had  in  addition  to  the  one  already  noticed. 

'  1  was  one  of  the  nine  members  that  composed  the  first 
committee  of  constitution.  Six  of  them  have  been  destroyed. 
Syeyes  and  myself  have  survived.  He  by  bending  with  the 
times,  and  I  by  not  bending.  The  other  survivor  joined 
Robespierre,  and  signed  with  him  the  warrant  of  my  arrest- 
ation.  After  the  fall  of  Robespierre,  he  was  seized  and  im- 
prisoned in  his  turn,  and  sentenced  to  transportation.  He 
has  since  apologised  to  me  for  Laving  signed  the  warrant, 
by  saying,  he  felt  himself  in  danger  and  was  obliged  to  do 
it. 

Herault  Sechelles,  an  acquaintance  of  Mr.  Jefferson,  and 
a  good  patriot,  was  my  suppliant  as  member  of  the  committee 
of  constitution  ;  that  is,  he  was  to  supply  my  place,  if  I  had 
not  accepted  or  had  resigned,  being  next  in  number  of  votes  to 
me.  He  was  imprisoned  in  the  Luxenburg  with  me,  was 
taken  to  the  tribunal  and  the  guillotine,  and  I,  his  principal, 
was  left. 

There  were  but  two  foreigners  in  the  convention,  Ana- 
charsis  Cloots*  and  myself.  We  were  both  put  out  of  the 
convention  by  the  same  vote,  arrested  by  the  same  order,  and 
carried  to  prison  together  the  same  night.  He  was  taken  to 


*  "  J.  B.  De  Cloots,  a  Prussian  Baron,  known  since  the  revolution  by  the 
name  of  Aracharsis  Cloots,  was  born  at  Cleves,  on  the  24th  of  June,  1755, 
and  became  the  possessor  of  a  considerable  fortune. 

In  September,  1792,  he  was  deputed  from  the  Oise  to  the  Convention. 

In  the  same  year  he  published  a  work  entitled  "  The  Universal  Republic,'' 
wherein  he  laid  it  down  as  a  principle  '  that  the  people  were  the  sovereign  of 
the  world — nay,  that  it  was  God' — '  that  fools  alone  believed  in  a  Supreme 
Being,'  &c.  He  soon  afterwards  fell  under  the  suspicions  of  Robespierre,  was 
arrested  as  a  Hebertist,  and  condemned  to  death  on  the  24th  of  March,  1794. 
He  died  with  great  firmness,  and  on  his  way  to  execution  lectured  Hebert  on 
materialism,'  to  prevent  him'  as  he  said,  •  from  yielding  to  religious  feelings  in 
his  last  moments.'  He  even  asked  to  be  executed  after  all  his  accomplices,  in 
order  that  he  might  have  time  '  to  establish  certain  principles  during  the  fall 
of  their  heads. — Biographic  Moderns. 

See,  also,  for  a  fuller  account  of  Baron  De  Cloote,  Thier's  "  History  9 
tfu  Frenclt,  Revolution." 


44  LIFE   OP   THOMAS    PAINE. 

the  guillotine,  and  I  was  again  left.     Joel  Barlow  was  with 
us  when  we  went  to  prison. 

Joseph  Lebon,  one  of  the  vilest  characters  that  ever 
existed,  and  who  made  the  streets  of  Arras  run  with  blood, 
was  my  suppliant  as  member  of  the  convention  for  the  de- 
partment of 'the  Pais  de  Calais.  When  I  was  put  out  of  the 
convention  he  came  and  took  my  place.  When  I  was 
liberated  from  prison,  and  voted  again  into  the  convention, 
he  was  sent  to  the  same  prison  and  took  my  place  there,  and 
he  went  to  the  guillotine  instead  of  me.  He  supplied  my 
place  all  the  way  through. 

One  hundred  and  sixty-eight  persons  were  taken  out  of 
the  Luxenbourg  in  one  night,  and  a  hundred  and  sixty  of  them 
guillotined  the  next  day,  of  which  I  know  I  was  to  have  been 
one  ;  and  the  manner  in  which  I  escaped  that  fate  is  curious, 
and  has  all  the  appearance  of  accident. 

The  room  in  which  I  was  lodged  was  on  the  ground  floor, 
and  one  of  a  long  range  of  rooms  under  a  gallery,  and  the 
door  of  it  opened  outward  and  flat  against  the  wall ;  so  that 
when  it  was  open  the  inside  of  the  door  appeared  outward, 
and  the  contrary  when  it  was  shut.  I  had  three  comrades, 
fellow-prisoners  with  me,  Joseph  Vanhuile  of  Bruges,  since 
president  of  the  municipality  of  that  town,  Michael  Robins, 
and  Bastini  of  Louvain. 

When  persons  by  scores  and  hundreds  were  to  be  taken 
out  of  prison  for  the  guillotine,  it  was  always  done  in  the 
night,  and  those  who  performed  that  office  had  a  private 
mark  or  signal  by  which  they  knew  what  rooms  to  go  to, 
and  what  number  to  take.  We,  as  I  have  said,  were  four, 
and  the  door  of  our  room  was  marked  unobserved  by  us,  with 
that  number  in  chalk  ;  but  it  happened,  if  happening  is 
a  proper  word,  that  the  mark  was  put  on  when  the  door  was 
open  and  flat  against  the  wall,  and  thereby  came  on  the  in- 
side when  we  shut  it  at  night,  and  the  destroying  angel  passed 
by  it.  A  few  days  after  this  Robespierre  fell,  and  the 
American  ambassador  arrived  and  reclaimed  me  and  invited 
me  to  his  house. 

During  the  whole  of  my  imprisonment,  prior  to  the  fall  of 
Robespierre,  there  was  no  time  when  I  could  think  my  life 
worth  twenty-four  hours,  and  my  mind  was  made  up  to  meet 
its  fate.  The  Americans  in  Paris  went  in  a  body  to  the  con- 
vention to  reclaim  me,  but  without  success.  There  was  no 
party  among  them  with  respect  to  me.  My  only  hope  then 
rested  on  the  government  of  America  that  it  would  remember 


PERIOD    THIRD.  45 

me.  But  the  icy  heart  of  ingratitude,  in  whatever  man  it 
may  be  placed,  has  neither  feeling  nor  sense  of  honor. 
The  letter  of  Mr.  Jefferson  has  served  to  wipe  away  the  re- 
proach, and  done  justice  to  the  mass  of  the  people  of  America." 

Soon  after  Mr.  Paine's  release,  the  convention,  by  a 
unanimous  vote,  reinstated  him  in  the  seat  he  had  formerly 
occupied.  Mr.  Paine  did  not  refuse,  being  resolved  to  show 
that  he  was  not  to  be  terrified,  and  that  his  principles  were 
neither  to  be  perverted  by  disgust  nor  weakened  by  misfortune. 

His  bodily  health  was  very  much  impaired  by  his  long 
confinement,  and  in  September  following,  he  was  taken 
dangerously  ill.  He  states  that  he  had  felt  the  approach  of 
his  disorder  for  some  time,  which  occasioned  him  to  hasten 
to  a  conclusion  of  the  second  part  of  the  "  Age  of  Reason." 
This  work  was  published  at  Paris,  early  in  1795,  and  was 
very  phortly  afterward  reprinted  both  in  England,  and  the 
United  States. 

The  "  Age  of  Reason  "  called  forth  a  great  many  replies, 
but  the  only  one  whose  fame  has  outlived  its  author,  is  the 
Bishop  of  Llandaff's  "  Apology  for  the  Bible."  Even  this  is 
in  defiance  of  the  plainest  rules  of  reason  and  logic,  and 
would  have  shared  the  fate  of  its  companions  in  the  same 
cause,  if  it  had  been  written  by  an  ordinary  person. 

The  advocates  of  the  Christian  faith  were  themselves  so 
conscious  of  the  imperfections  of  their  system,  and  placed  so 
little  reliance  on  the  Bishop's  arguments,  that  they  commenced 
a  prosecution  against  Mr.  Williams,  the  publisher  of  the 
"  Age  of  Reason.'  They  retained  Mr.  Erskine  on  the  part  of 
the  crown,  who  made  every  effort  to  procure  a  verdict.  Mr. 
Kyd  made  an  ingenious  and  able  reply,  in  behalf  of  the  de- 
fendant, but  the  jury,  being  special,  readily  found  him  guilty, 
June  4,  1797.  Mr.  Paine  addressed  a  letter  to  Mr.  Erskine 
on  the  proceedings  of  this  trial,  in  which  he  ridiculed  the  ab- 
surdity of  discussing  theological  subjects  before  such  men  as 
special  juries  are  generally  composed  of,  and  cited  fresh  evi- 
dence in  support  of  his  former  arguments  against  the  truth  of 
the  Bible. 

But.  although  the  anti-biblical  works  of  Mr.  Paine  were 
well  able  to  withstand  the  Bishop  of  Llandaff's  attacks,  and 
have  unquestionably  made  a  greater  number  of  mere  unbe- 
lievers than  have  those  of  any  other  writer,  they  strongly  re- 
mind those  who  comprehend  the  all-important  materialistic 
significancy  which  underlies  "  supernaturalism,"  of  the  sug- 
gestions which  their  author  so  sensibly  threw  out,  in  his 


4:6  LIFE   OP   THOMAS  PAINE. 

letter  to  Mr.  Erskine,  with  respect  to  the  abilities  of  juries 
to  deal  with  theological  matters. 

Paine  himself  took  far  less  pride  in  his  Theological  writ- 
ings than  in  any  of  his  others.  This  is  too  observable  to 
need  to  be  pointed  out  in  detail.  He  had  comparatively  such 
small  expectations  with  respect  to  the  good  which  he  be- 
lieved he  had  the  talents  to  perform  by  meddling  with  "  su- 
pernaturalism,"  that  he  postponed  the  execution  of  that  part 
of  his  life's  mission  to  the  latter  end  of  his  career  ;  and  it  is 
worthy  of  note,  that  in  his  will,  he  requested  that  it  should  be 
engraved  on  his  tomb-stone,  not  that  he  was  the  author  of 
"  The  Age  of  Reason,"  or  of  the  "  Examination  of  The  Pro- 
phecies ;"  but  of  "  Common  Sense" 

In  the  perfected,  or  even  half  regenerate  future,  the  author 
of  "  the  world  is  my  country  ;  to  do  good  my  religion"  though 
he  had  never  written  "  Common  Sense,"  "  The  Crisis,"  or 
"  Rights  of  Man  ;" — nay,  though  he  had  never  written  another 
line,  will  stand  higher  than  will  the  ablest  mere  exposer  and 
denouncer  of  error  and  delusion,  that  ever  handled  a  pen. 

There  is,  it  must  be  confessed,  in  Mr.  -Paine's  treatment 
of  the  great  question  involved  in  anthropomorphism,  or  "  the- 
ology," nothing  of  the  profundity  of  Feuerbach,  or  of  the 
thoroughness,  and  searching  and  learned  inquiry  concerning 
the  mythical  substructure  of  Christianity,  which  so  eminently 
distinguishes  Strauss  ;  and  there  is  but  little  of  the  careful 
research  of  Volney,  Dupuis  and  Robert  Taylor,  in  either  the 
"  Age  of  Reason  "  or  the  "  Examination  of  The  Prophecies." 
Their  author  is  altogether  too  deficient  in  the  bland  and  win- 
ning persuasiveness  of  Greg,  and  has  not  an  overstock  of  the 
candour,  and  patient  criticism  of  Macnaught. 

For  proof  of  this,  compare  Paine's  theological  master- 
pieces, just  named,  with  Strauss's  "  Critical  Examination  of 
the  Life  of  Jesus,"  Volney's  "  Ruins  of  Empires,"  and  "  New 
Researches  on  Ancient  History,"  Dupuis's  "  Origine  de  tous 
les  Cultes,"*  Taylor's  "  Diegesis,"  "  Astronomico-Theological 
Sermons,"  and  "  Devil's  Pulpit,"  Greg's  "  Creed  of  Christen- 
dom  ;  Its  Foundations  and  Superstructure,"  Macnaught  on 
"  The  Doctrine  of  Inspiration,"  and  that  natural  history  of 
''  supernaturalism," — Feuerbach's  "  Essence  of  Christian- 
tty.» 

*  Published  by  Mr.  Gilbert  Yale. 

The  other  works  here  referred  to,  and  also  "  The  Age  of  Beaaor.,'  and 
"  Examination  of  The  Prophecies,"  arc  published  by  C.  Blanchan*. 


PERIOD   THIRD.  47 

There  is  nothing  like  constructive  revolution  in  Mr. 
Paine's  attacks  on  the  ecclesiastical  hierarchy  which  has  been, 
notwithstanding  its  faults,  and  its  now,  and  for  some  time 
past,  abominable  abuses,  the  nurse  of  civilization — the  initia- 
tor of  human  progress. 

But  there  is,  in  the  effects  of  his  attacks  on  venerable 
abuses,  that  which  is  fast  neccessitating  constructive  revolu- 
tion. 

Still,  it  is  to  be  regretted  that  so  many  of  those  whom 
Mr.  Fame's  caustic  arguments  put  in  more  zealous  than  for- 
midable battle  array  against  priestcraft,  run  away  with  the 
idea,  so  unjust  and  humiliating  to  human  nature,  that  the 
whole  gospel  system  was,  from  the  beginning,  but  a  nefarious 
scheme  of  priests  and  kings,  whereby  to  destroy  liberty  ;  that 
the  Church  has  always  been  but  a  hypocritical  and  tyranni- 
cal organiiution.  For  in  consequence  of  these  views,  they 
think  that  they  have  found  out  all  that  need  be  known  with 
respect  to  the  great  question  of  man's  instinctive  faith;  and 
vainly  imagme,  that  through  the  power  of  reason  alone,  all 
the  temples  of  superstition  can  be  demolished,  or  shaved 
down  TO  common  shool-houses  ;  and  think  that  this  will  make 
the  woild  about  as  good  as  it  is  capable  of  becoming. 

The  plain  truth  is,  that  Mr.  Paine's  theological  views  are 
as  superficial  as  his  religious  conceptions  are  profound.  [It 
will  be  recollected  that  "  to  do  good,"  was  Mr.  Paine's  reli- 
gion.] His  belief  in  a  supernatural  "  God."  in  "  happiness 
after  death,"  and  in  "  some  punishment  for  the  wicked," 
though  immeasurably  less  atrocious  than  the  Judaistic  and 
Paganistic  Christianism  which  he  combatted,  are  not  a  whit 
more  intelligible  ;  and  had  "  The  Age  of  Reason  "  been  writ- 
ten by  some  sharp-witted  magazine  critic,  instead  of  by  the 
author  of  "  The  Crisis,"  "  Common  Sense,"  and  "  Rights  of 
Man  ;" — or  by  some  obscure  individual,  instead  of  by  the  com- 
panion of,  and  co-worker  with,  Washington,  Jefferson,  Frank- 
lin, Adams,  and  Lafayette,  its  notoriety  never  would  have 
reached  the  height  to  which  it  immediately  arose,  and  which, 
owing  to  clerical  persecution,  and  to  the  abominable  injustice 
and  ingratitude  with  which  Paine  has  been  treated,  it 
will  no  doubt  gain  upon  for  some  time  to  come. 

But  we  must,  in  full  justice  to  Thomas  Paine,  take  into 
account  the  fact,  that  his  theology  is  susceptible  of  a  very 
liberal  interpretation.  I,  too,  materialist  though  I  am,* 

*  Of  all  the  Oeistical  works  that  I  hare  examined,  none  appear  to  me 


48  LIFE   OF   THOMAS   PAINE. 

believe  m  a  God  ;  a  God  as  infinite  as  is  all  of  •which  we  can 
conceive  ;  ay,  and  as  real ;  a  God  as  almighty  as  is  materi- 
ality ;  which  is  at  once  both  agent  and  act,  and  out  of  whose 
presence  we  cannot  go  even  in  thought,  will  prove  to  be, 
through  that  only  intelligible  miracle, — development. 

I  believe,  furthermore,  in  the  punishment  of  the  wicked  ; 
and  that,  too,  after  death.  Nay,  I  know  that  the  punishment 
of  all  sin  is  inevitable.  Is  not  that  monster  of  iniquity,  so- 
ciety, though  dead  and  all  but  rotten  in  "  trespasses  and  sins," 
undergoing  the  very  torments  of  the  damned  ? 

I  hope  for,  nay,  I  know  that  I  shall  have,  happiness  after 
death; — that  every  particle  of  me  will,  through  chemical 
change,  and  the  refinements  which  nature  is  with  rapidly  in- 
creasing speed,  elaborating,  go  -to  form  material  beings  as 
much  happier  than  any  which  now  exist,  as  "  glorified  saints 
and  angels  "  are  imagined  to  be. 

But  Mr.  Paine  has  won  such  laurels  through  his  political 
writings,  that  he  can  richly  afford  to  yield  the  palm  with  re- 
spect to  theology  ;  not  that  he  has  not,  though  negatively, 
done  good  service,  even  in  this  field.  His  theological  writ- 
ings have  cleared  the  way  for  the  practical  and  positive  in 
social  affairs,  by  showing  that  reason,  or  speculativeness,  though 
of  importance  in  starting  the  march  of  human  progress,  is 
utterly  inefficient  in  the  all  important  respects  of  the  motive 
and  the  creative  power,  necessary  to  speed  that  progress  to 
its  goal. 

The  "  Age  of  Reason  "  negatively  prepared  the  way  for 
the  introduction  of  science  and  art  into  social  architecture  ; 
for  the  inauguration  of  the  knowable,  the  practical,  the  hu- 
mane the  efficient,  in  place  of  the  mysterious,  the  speculative, 
the  vindictive,  the  provisional,  and  otherwise  abortive. 

I  know  that  these  views  will  be  somewhat  distasteful  to 
many  of  Mr.  Paine's  admirers  ;  but  I  have  undertaken  to 
give  an  impartial  history,  and  therefore  cannot  let  my  own 
admiration  or  that  of  others  for  the  great  man  I  am  writing 
about,  blind  me  to  the  great  truth,  that,  till  the  perfection 
point  be  gained,  means,  even  those  as  powerful  as  Mr.  Paine 

to  be  less  inconsistent  than  the  one  by  Henri  Disdier,  avocat,  published  at 
Geneva,  in  1859.  His  remarks  on  the  clergy's  great  lever,  education,  ought 
to  be  read  by  every  reformer.  The  work  is  entitled — "  Conciliation  Ra- 
tionnelle  du  Droit  et  du  Devoir."  It  appears  to  me  that  M.  Disdier  has 
omitted  no  argument  that  can  be  adduced  to  support  the  proposition  that 
there  exists  a  "  Supernatural  God,"  or  "  Dieu  Personnel." 


PERIOD  THIRD.  49 

used,  must,  as  fast  as  they  exhaust  their  efficacy,  be  thrust  aside 
for  those  of  greater  and  greater  potency. 

Opinionism  has  long  since  fulfilled  its  function  in  the  so- 
cial organism,  and  therefore  cannot  too  soon  be  rejected, 
along  with  its  correlative,  moralism,  and  that  now  main  de- 
pendence of  vice, — virtue.  Principle  has  become  an  excre- 
scence, and  should  be  immediately  expelled  for  enlightened 
selfishness.  Principle  is  the  barricade  behind  which  hypo- 
crisy hides.  It  encumbers  the  path  through  which  actual 
progress  ought  to  have  a  free  passage. 

But  to  return  to  the  thread  of  this  history  : — 

In  April,  1795,  a  committee  was  appointed  to  form  an- 
other new  constitution,  (the  former  one  having  been  abolished) 
and  the  report  of  this  committee  was  brought  forward  on  the 
23d  of  June  following,  by  Boissy  d'Anglais. 

In  1795,  Mr.  Paine  wrote  a  speech  in  opposition  to  sev- 
eral of  the  articles  of  the  new  constitution  which  had  been 
presented  for  adoption,  which  was  translated  and  read  to  the 
convention  by  Citizen  Lanthera,  on  the  seventh  of  July.  He 
particularly  contended  against  the  unjust  distinction  that 
was  attempted  to  be  made  between  direct  and  indirect  taxes. 
Whatever  weight  his  objections  ought  to  have  carried,  they 
were  not  listened  to  by  the  convention,  and  the  constitution 
of  Boissy  d'Anglais  was  adopted.  By  this  decree  the  conven- 
tion was  formally  dissolved  ;  and  as  Mr.  Paine  was  not  after- 
ward re-elected,  it  also  terminated  his  public  functions  in 
France. 

The  reign  of  terror*  having  somewhat  subsided,   Mr. 

*  Let  me  not  be  misunderstood,  in  speaking  as  I  have,  and  shall,  of  de- 
magogues, priests,  and  "  oppressors  "  generally.  I  by  no  means  approve  of 
the  avalanche  of  blame  in  which  Robespierre  has  been  overwhelmed.  He 
and  his  colleagues  were  but  the  instruments  of  an  infuriated  populace  which 
an  unfortunate  train  of  circumstances  had  let  loose  upon  those  whom  equally 
unfortunate  causes  had  made  their  oppressors. 

It  is  highly  worthy  of  attention,  that  all  the  blood  shed  during  the  long 
"  infidel  "  "reign  of  terror,"  amounted  to  but  little  more  than  half  what  had 
flown  in  a  single  day,  (St.  Bartholomew's)  under  the  reign  of  supernaturalis- 
tfc  terror.  The  whole  number  guillotined  by  order  of  the  Revolutionary 
tribunal  was,  18.  603,  viz  : — Nobles,  1,278.  Noble  women,  750.  Wives  of 
laborers  and  artisans,  1,467.  Religeuses,  350.  Priests,  1,135.  Common 
persons,  not  noble,  13,623. 

The  lowest  estimate  of  the  number  of  victims  of  the  St.  Bartholomew 
massacre,  is  25.000  ;  but  there  is  every  reason  for  supposing  that  the  ann> 
her  was  not  less  than  30,000. 

In  six  weeks  time,  the  supernaturalistically  misguided  duke  of  Alva,  in- 

S 


60  LIFE   OF   THOMAS   PAINE. 

Paine  resumed  his  pen.  About  the  time  when  he  brought 
out  the  second  part  of  the  "  Age  of  Reason,"  he  published 
several  pamphlets  on  subjects  less  likely  to  inflame  the  pas- 
sions of  we  bigoted  and  ignorant ;.  the  principal  of  these  are 
his  "  Dissertation  on  first  Principles  of  Government,"  "  Agra- 
rian Justice  opposed  to  Agrarian  Law,"  and  the  "  Decline 
and  Fall  of  the  English  System  of  Finance."  The  first  of 
these  is  a  continuation  of  the  arguments  advanced  in  the 
"  Rights  of  Man  ;"  the  second  is  a  plan  for  creating  in  every 
country  a  national  fund  "  to  pay  to  every  person  when  ar- 
rived at  the  age  of  twenty-one  years,  the  sum  of  fifteen  pounds 
sterling,  to  enable  him  or  her  to  begin  the  world,  and  also  ten 

Sounds  sterling,  per  annum,  during  life,  to  every  person,  now 
ving,  of  the  age  of  fifty  years,  and  to  all  others,  when  they 
shall  arrive  at  that  age,  to  enable  them  to  live  without  wretch- 
edness, in  old  age,  and  to  go  decently  out  of  the  world." 

In  1796,  he  published  at  Paris  a  "  Letter  to  General  Wash- 
ington." The  principal  subject  of  this  letter  was  the  treaty 
which  had  recently  been  concluded  between  the  United  States 
and  Great  Britain.  From  the  articles  of  the  treaty,  Mr.  Paine 
contends,  that  those  who  concluded  it  had  compromised  the 
honor  of  America,  and  the  safety  of  her  commerce,  from  a 
disposition  to  crouch  to  the  British  ministry.  The  cold  neg- 
lect of  Washington  toward  Mr.  Paine  during  his  imprison- 
ment, forms  likewise  a  prominent  subject  of  the  letter,  and 
but  for  this  circumstance,  it  is  probable  that  it  would  never 
have  appeared.  Notwithstanding  the  high  opinion  which 
Washington  professed  to  entertain  of  his  services  in  behalf 
of  American  independence,  he  abandoned  him  in  a  few  years 
afterward  to  the  mercy  of  Robespierre,  and  during  his  im- 
prisonment of.  eleven  months,  he  never  made  an  effort  to  re- 
lease him.  This  was  not  the  treatment  which  the  author  of 
"  The  Crisis  "  deserved  at  the  hands  of  Washington,  either 
as  a  private  individual,  or  as  president  of  the  United  States. 
Exclusive  of  Mr.  Paine's  being  a  citizen  of  the  United  States, 
and  consequently  entitled  to  the  protection  of  its  govern- 
ment, he  had  rendered  her  services  which  none  but  the  un- 
grateful could  forget ;  he  had  therefore  no  reason  to  expect 
that  her  chief  magistrate  would  abandon  him  in  the  hour  of 

stigated  the  murder,  for  conscience  sake,  of  18,000  people,  in  the  small  king- 
dom of  the  Netherlands. 

IB  it  not  time  that  the  murderous  system  of  blame  and  punishment,  to 
gether  with  their  correlate,  principle,  was  superseded  ? 


PERIOD   THIRD.  61 

peril.  However  deserving  of  our  admiration  some  parts  of 
General  Washington's  conduct  towards  Mr.  Paine  may  be, 
his  behaviour  in  this  instance  certainly  reflects  no  honor  upon 
his  character  ;  and  we  are  utterly  at  a  loss  for  *n  excuse 
for  it,  on  recollecting  that  when  the  American  residents  of 
Paris  demanded  Paine's  release,  the  answer  of  the  convention 
mainly  was,  that  the  demand  could  not  be  listened  to 
'*  in  consequence  of  its  not  being  authorized  by  the  American 
government" 

Mr.  Paine  regarded  the  United  States  as  his  home  ;  and 
although  his  spirit  of  universal  philanthropy,  his  republican 
principles,  and  his  resolution  in  attacking  fraud  in  politics 
and  superstition  in  religion,  rendered  him  rather  a  citizen  of 
the  world,  than  of  any  particular  country,  he  had  domestic 
feelings  and  pivotal  attachments.  During  his  residence  in  Eu- 
rope, he  always  declared  his  intention  of  returning  to  America ; 
the  following  extract  from  a  letter  of  his  to  a  lady  at  New 
York,  will  show  the  affectionate  regard  which  he  cherished 
for  the  country  whose  affairs  were  the  means  of  first  launching 
him  into  public  life : — 

'  You  touch  me  on  a  very  tender  point,  when  you  say.  that 
my  friends  on  your  side  of  tJie  water  cannot  be  reconciled  to  the 
idea  of  my  abandoning  America  even  for  my  native  England. 
They  are  right.  I  had  rather  see  my  horse,  Button,  eating 
the  grass  of  Bordertown,  or  Morrissania,  than  see  all  the  pomp 
and  show  of  Europe. 

A  thousand  years  hence,  for  I  must  indulge  a  few  thoughts, 
perhaps  in  less,  America  may  be  what  England  now  is.  The 
innocence  of  her  character,  that  won  the  hearts  of  all  nations 
in  her  favor,  may  sound  like  a  romance,  and  her  inimitable 
virtue  as  if  it  had  never  been.  The  ruins  of  that  liberty, 
which  thousands  bled  to  obtain,  may  just  furnish  materials  for 
a  village  tale,  or  extort  a  sigh  from  rustic  sensibility  ;  while 
the  fashionable  of  that  day,  enveloped  in  dissipation,  shall 
deride  the  principle  and  deny  the  fact. 

When  we  contemplate  the  fall  of  empires,  and  the 
extinction  of  the  nations  of  the  ancient  world,  we  see  but 
littl^  more  to  excite  our  regret  than  the  mouldering  ruins  of 
pompous  palaces,  magnificent  monuments,  lofty  pyramids,  and 
walls  and  towers  of  the  most  costly  workmanship  :  but  when 
the  empire  of  America  shall  fall,  the  subject  for  contemplative 
sorrow  will  be  infinitely  greater  than  crumbling  brass  or 
marble  can  inspire.  It  will  not  then  be  said,  Here  stood  a 
temple  of  vast  antiquity,  here  rose  a  Babal  of  invisible  height; 


52  LIFE   OF   THOMAS  PAINE. 

or  there  a  palace  of  sumptuous  extravagance  ;  but  here,  ah  I 
painful  thought !  the  noblest  work  of  human  wisdom,  the 
greatest  scene  of  human  glory,  the  fair  cause  of  freedom,  rose 
and  fell !  Read  this,  then  ask  if  I  forgot  America.' 

In  1797,  a  society  was  formed  in  Paris,  under  the  title  of 
"  Theophilanthropists."  Of  this  society,  Mr.  Paine  was  one 
of  th  =  principal  founders.  More  of  this  anon. 

This  year  Mr.  Paine  published  a  '  Letter  to  the  People  of 
France,  on  the  Events  of  the  eighteenth  Fructidor.' 

About  the  middle  of  the  same  year  he  also  wrote  a  letter 
to  Camille  Jordan,  one  of  the  council  of  five  hundred, 
respecting  his  report  on  the  priests,  public  worship,  and  bells. 
'  It  is  want  of  feeling,'  says  he,  '  to  talk  of  priests  and  bells, 
while  so  many  infants  are  perishing  in  the  hospitals,  and  aged 
and  infirm  poor  in  the  streets  from  the  want  of  necessaries. 
The  abundance  that  France  produces  is  sufficient  for  every 
want,  if  rightly  applied  ;  but  priests  and  bells,  like  articles 
of  luxury,  ought  to  be  the  least  articles  of  consideration.' 

The  publication  of  his  deistical  opinions  lost  Mr.  Paine  a 
great  number  of  his  friends,  and,  it  is  possible,  that  this  might 
be  one  of  the  causes  of  General  Washington's  indifference. 
The  clear,  open,  and  bold  manner  in  which  he  had  exposed 
the  fallacy  of  long  established  opinions,  called  forth  the  in- 
dignation of  the  whole  order  of  priesthood  both  in  England 
and  America,  and  there  was  scarcely  a  house  of  devotion, 
in  either  country,  which  did  not  ring  with  pious  execrations 
against  the  author  of  the  "  Age  of  Reason."  The  apostles  of 
superstition  witnessed  with  amazement  and  terror  the  im- 
mense circulation  of  the  work,  and  trembled  at  the  pos- 
sibility that  men  might  come  to  think  for  themselves.* 

*  The  late  Mr.  George  H.  Evans,  (one  of  the  first  movers  of  the  land  reform 
question)  -was  the  first  collector  and  publisher  of  Paine's  Works  in  this 
country  ;  and  the  late  Frances  Wright  D'Arusmont  rendered,  and  Mrs.  E.  L. 
Eose  is  now  rendering,  most  efficient  aid  in  disseminating  such  views 
of  these  works  as  the  popular  mind  is  capable  of  taking. 

The  constructive  revolutionist  must  admire  the  stand  she  has  so  bravely 
and  ably  taken  with  respect  to  woman's  rights,  however  exceptionable  som& 
of  the  measures  she  has  advocated  may  be  considered. 

Bat  there  is  no  danger  that  the  legitimate  object  of  man's  Adora- 
tion,— woman,  can  be  drawn  into  that  maelstrom  of  abomination, — caucus- 
and-ballot-boxism,  and  if  I  mistake  not.  Mrs.  Rose  does  not  press  the 
extension  of  "  elective  franchise"  to  her  sex  quite  as  vigorously  as  she  used 
to.  At  all  events,  she  is  doing-  good  service  to  the  cause  of  human  emanci- 
pation ;  she  has  been  a  pioneer  in  a  reform  on  which  further  progress  im- 
portantly depends  ,  for  which  she  deserves  the  hearty  "  thanks  of  man  and 
woman." 


PERIOD   THIRD.  5S 

On  leaving  the  house  of  Mr.  Monroe,  Paine  boarded 
in  the  family  of  Nicholas  Bonneville,  a  gentleman  in  good 
circumstances,  and  editor  of  a  political  paper,  the  <:  Bouche  de 
Fer." 

In  1797,  the  society  of  "  Theophilanthropists"  was  formed 
in  Paris  ;  Men  capable  of  any  reflection  began  to  see  how 
utterly  monstrous  was  the  attempt  to  dispense  with  religion 
—  with  a  universal  higher  law  to  which  to  appeal  —  with 
something  to  satisfy,  or  at  least  prevent  from  being  utterly 
discouraged,  the  instinctive  aspirations  of  the  human  heart. 
Robespierre  objected  to  atheism  as  aristocratic  ;  but  Paine 
saw  somewhat  further  than  this,  and  Lare"villiere,  a  member 
of  the  Directory,  was  impressed  with  the  necessity  of  a  sys- 
tym  which  should  rival  the  catholic  church  itself.  The  idea 
was  supremely  great,  and  lacked  only  the  Comtean  conception 
of  science  to  make  it  a  success.  As  it  was,  however,  it  proved 
a  worse  failure  than  has  even  Christianism.  Pure  Deism  is 
not  at  all  more  intelligible  than  is  that  mixture  of  Deism, 
Buddhism,  Judaism,  and  Paganism,  called  Christianity  ;  and 
the  cold  moralism  which  is  attached  to  the  one  God  system, 
the  human  heart  instinctively  abhors.  Paine,  and  all  the 
other  doctors  of  divinity  with  whom  he  was  in  unison,  were 
far  behind  even  Mahomet,  or  Joe  Smith,  in  respect  to  theo- 


Haiiy,  a  brother  of  the  eminent  crystallogist,  assembled  the 
first  society  of  Theophilanthropists.  They  held  their  meet- 
mgs  on  Sunday,  and  had  their  manual  of  worship  and  hymn- 
book. 

Robespierre  had,  three  years  before,  given  a  magnificent 
fete  in  honor  of  VEtre  Supreme,  and  Paine  now  delivered  a 
discourse  before  one  of  the  Theophilanthropist  congregations, 

Abner  Kneeland  was,  I  believe,  the  first  editor  of  the  first  "openly 
avowed  Intidel  paper"  in  the  United  States,  —  the  Boston  Investigator  ;  now 
edited  by  Horace  Seaver,  Esq. 

As  to  Theodore  Parker,  his  exertions  in  the  cause  of  free  inquiry  are  of 
world-wide  notori  ty  ;  and  I  will  here  mention  that  "  The  Evidences  against 
Christianity,"  by  John  S.  Hittell,  should  be  the  hand-book  of  all  those  who 
look  to«reason,  free  discussion,  and  to  an  exposure  of  falsehood  and  error,  for 
the  salvation  of  the  human  race. 

The  services  which  Mr.  Joseph  Barker  has  rendered  the  liberal  cause  will 
not  soon  be  forgotten.  His  debate  with  Dr.  Berg  floors  Christianity  to  the 
almost  that  argument  can.  But  I  much  prefer  the  valedictory  letter  which 
he  published  in  the  "  Investigator,"  previous  to  his  departure  for  Europe. 
Evidently,  the  writer  is  beginning  to  see  that  something  more  than  mew 
negativism  is  needed  to  put  down  superstition. 


54  LIFE   OF   THOMAS  PAINE. 

in  which  he  attempted  to  blend  science  and  "  supernaturalism." 
That  some  parts  of  this  discourse  would  have  done  honor 
to  an  Orthodox  divine,  the  following  extracts  will  attest : — 
"  Do  we  want  to  contemplate  His  [God's]  power  ?  We 
see  it  in  the  immensity  of  the  creation.  Do  we  want  to 
contemplate  His  wisdom  ?  We  see  it  in  the  unchangeable 
order  fty  which  the  incomprehensible  whole  is  governed.  Do 
we  want  to  contemplate  His  mercy  ?  We  see  it  in  His  not 
withholding  His  abundance  even  from  the  unthankful.  In 
fine,  do  we  want  to  know  what  God  is  ?  Search  not  written 
books,  but  the  Scriptures  called  the  Creation." 

The  finale  of  the  miserable  political  and  religious  farce 
which  had  been  played  in  France,  was,  that,  in  1799,  Bona- 
parte sent  a  file  of  grenadiers  to  turn  both  the  political  and 
theological  quacks  out  of  their  halls  ;  and  the  sooner  some 
Bonaparte  does  the  same  thing  in  the  United  States,  the 
sooner  will  the  cause  of  liberty  be  at  least  delivered  from  the 
management  of  those  who  are  insulting,  disgracing,  and 
treacherously  betraying  it. 

Whilst  writing  this,  the  two  great  parties  of  spoil-seekers 
in  the  United  States,  have  been  caucusing  for,  and  have  at 
length  decided  on,  two  individuals  out  of  some  thirty  millions, 
one  of  whom  is  to  be  demagogism's  cat's-paw  general  for  the 
next  four  years. 

The  qualifications  of  one  of  these  candidates  for  the  pres- 
idential chair,  consist  in  his  having  been  a  "  farm-laborer,  a 
common  workman  in  a  saw-mill,  and  a  boatman  on  the 
W abash  and  Mississippi  rivers  ;"  a  wood-chopper,  a  hunter,  a 
soldier  in  the  Black  Hawk  war,  a  clerk  in  a  store,  and  finally 
a  sham-law  manufacturer  and  monger — a  member  of  a  Legis- 
lature, and  a  lawyer.  The  qualifications  of  his  opponent  on 
the  political  race-course,  are  probably  about  as  different  in 
respect  to  value,  from  those  just  enumerated,  as  fiddlededum 
is  from  fiddlededee. 

Those  convenient  tools  of  both  parties,  those  chessmen 
with  which  the  political  game  is  played — The  People,  how- 
ever, have  great  expectations  of  reform  from  which  ever 
candidate  they  vote  (tJiey  vote  1  do  they  ?  Faugh  /)  for,  pro- 
vided he  is  elected.  But  mark  me  well,  my  dear  fellow-suffer- 
ers ;  you,  and  all,  except  about  one  in  fifty  or  a  hundred  of  the 
office-seekers  whose  thievish  fingers  itch  for  the  public 
treasury,  are  destined  to  utter,  and  most  woeful  dispoint- 
ment.  Still,  I  neither  blame  the  demagogues  nor  your- 
selves. In  the  concluding  sentences  of  this  history,  I  shall 


PERIOD   THIRD.  56 

tell  you  where  the  fault  lies ;  for  I  hope,  that  the  political 
scamps  who,  iu  this  country,  are  making  the  name  of  freedom 
a  scorn  and  a  derision  throughout  the  rest  of  the  world,  will 
be  eliminated  by  those  who  will  make  liberty  an  actuality. 
How  this  may  be  done,  I  claim  to  have  demonstrated  in  "  Tfie 
Religion  of  Science,"  and  "  Essence  of  Science." 

Throughout  Paine's  political  writings,  notwithstanding 
their  popularistic  dressings,  there  runs  a  tone  entirely  con- 
demnatory of  demagogism,  and  highly  suggestive  of  social 
science  and  art.  And  there  is  no  question  but  that  the 
miserable  abortion  in  which  the  liberty-agitation  seemed  to 
terminate  in  France,  and  the  failing  aspect  which  it  took  on 
in  America,  even  in  his  day,  all  but  "  burst  his  mighty  heart," 
and  made  him  somewhat  careless,  though  far  from  slovenly, 
with  respect  to  his  person. 

Paine's  opposition  to  the  atheists,  on  the  one  hand,  and  to 
the  cruelty  of  those  who,  headed  by  Robespierre,  had  instituted 
the  worship  of  the  "  Supreme  Being,"  on  the  other,  had 
gradually  rendered  him  unpopular  in  France.  His  remittances 
from  the  United  States  not  being  very  regular,  M.  Bonneville 
added  generosity  to  the  nobleness  which  he,  considering  the 
circumstances  displayed,  in  opening  his  door  to  Mr.  Paine, 
by  lending  him  money  whenever  he  wanted  it. 

This  kindness,  Paine  had  soon  both  the  opportunity  and 
the  means  of  reciprocating  ;  for  majority  absolutism  had  now 
become  so  unbearably  despotic,  so  exceedingly  morbific  tc 
the  social  organism  in  France,  that  to  save  civilization  even 
from  destruction,  Bonaparte  had  to  be  invested  with  supreme 
power  in  the  State,  and  the  nominally  free  press  of  M.  Bon- 
neville was  consequently  stopped. 

Mr.  Paine's  liberty  mission  in  France,  having  now  evi- 
dently failed,  [always  remembering  that  nothing  in  nature  is 
an  absolute  failure — that  progress  is  the  constant  rule  and  the 
seeming  contrary  but  an  aberration]  he  at  once  resolved  to 
return  to  the  United  States,  where  he  offered  an  asylum  to 
M.  Bonneville  and  family  ;  in  consequence  of  which,  Madame 
Bonneville  and  her  three  sons  soon  left  Paris  for  New  York. 

Owing  to  some  cause  or  other,  but  not  to  the  one  which 
Paine's  slanderers  were  afterwards  mulcted  in  damages,  even 
in  a  Christian  court  of  Justice,  for  assigning,  M.  Bonne- 
ville did  not  accompany  them.  The  eldest  son  returned  to 
his  father,  in  Paris ;  but  Mr.  Paine  amply  provided  for  the 
maintenance  of  Madame  Bonneville  and  her  two  sons  who 
remained  in  America. 


56  LIFE  OF  THOMAS  PAINE. 

At  Paris,  such  personages  as  the  Earl  of  Lauderdale,  Dr.. 
Moore,  Brissot.  the  Marquis  de  Chatelet  le  Eoi,  General  Mi- 
randa, Capt.  Imlay,  Joel  Ba^ow,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Stone,  and 
Mary  Wollstonecraft,*  sought  the  honor  of  Mr.  Paine's  com- 
pany. 

That  Mr.  Paine's  eloquence  and  power  of  reasoning  were 
unsurpassed  even  by  Cicero.  Demosthenes  or  Daniel  Webster, 
his  political  writings  fully  attest. 

Before  it  became  known  who  wrote  "  Common  Sense,"  it 
was  by  some  attributed  to  Dr.  Franklin  ;  others  insisted  that 
it  was  by  that  elegant  writer  of  English, — John  Adams.f 

"  It  has  been  very  generally  propagated  through  the  con- 
tinent," says  Mr.  Adams,  "  that  I  wrote  this  pamphlet.***  I 
could  not  have  written  any  thing  in  so  manly  and  striking  a 
style."  This  eulogy,  be  it  remembered,  was  pronounced  by 
one  who  was  so  jealous  of  Paine's  credit  in  the  matter  of  the 
Declaration  of  Independence,  that,  says  Randall,  in  his  Life 
of  Thomas  Jefferson,  he  "  spares  no  occasion  to  underrate 
Paine's  services,  and  to  assault  his  opinions  and  character."^ 

Mr.  Randall  continues : — 

"  A  more  effective  popular  appeal  [than  '  Common  Sense'] 
never  went  to  the  bosoms  of  a  nation.  Its  tone,  its  manner, 
its  biblical  illusions,  its  avoidance  of  all  openly  impassioned 
appeals  to  feeling,  and  its  unanswerable  common  sense  were 
exquisitely  adapted  to  the  great  audience  to  which  it  was 

*  Authoress  of  "  A  Vindication  of  the  Rights  of  Woman,  with  Stric- 
tures on  Political  and  Moral  Subjects."  A  work,  the  exceeding  merit  of 
which  has  been  lost  sight  of,  in  its  name,  since  woman's  rights  have  been- 
claimed  to  consist  in  the  liberty  to  degrade  herself  to  the  level  of  the  politi- 
cian. 

f  That  that  great  patriot,  John  Adams,  and  many  other  revolutionary 
worthies  vaguely  entertained  the  idea  of  Independence  before  "  Gomroon 
Sense  "  was  published,  there  can  be  no  doubt.  But  the  question  ig,  who. 
had  the  courage  to  first  propose  the  thing,  and  in  a  practical  shape  ?  That 
Mr.  Adam's  prudence  predominated  over  his  courage,  great  as  that 
was,  is  further  deducible  from  the  strung  reason  there  was  for  the  inference 
that  his  religious  opinions,  if  openly  expressed,  would  have  appeared  as  far 
from  the  orthodox  standard,  as  were  those  of  Paine.  See  Randall's  Life  of 
Jefferson,  on  this  point. 

J  I  have  before  called  the  attention  of  the  reader  to  the  fact  that  Rous- 
seau was,  like  Paine,  an  "  author  hero  ;"  his  writings  were  prominently  the 
text  of  the  French  Revolution.  I  will  further  remark,  that  whoever  drew 
up  the  "  Declaration  of  Independence,"  has  given  indisputable  evidence  of 
having  well  studied  the  "  Control  Social "  of  the  author  of  the  "  world-famous" 
u  Confessions." 


PERIOD   THIRD.  57 

addressed  ;  and  calm  investigation  will  satisfy  the  historical 
student,  that  its  effect  in  preparing  the  popular  mind  for  the 
Declaration  of  Independence,  exceeded  that  of  any  othei 
paper,  speech,  or  document  made  to  favor  it,  and  it  would 
scarcely  be  exaggeration  to  add,  than  all  other  such  means 
put  together." 

"  No  writer,"  says  Thomas  Jefferson,  "  has  exceeded  Paine 
in  ease  and  familiarity  of  style,  in  perspicuity  of  expression, 
happiness  of  elucidation,  and  in  simple  and  unassuming 
language." 

Says  General  Washington,  in  a  letter  to  Joseph  Reed, 
(Jan.  31,  1776)  ;  "  A  few  more  such  flaming  arguments  as 
were  exhibited  at  Falmouth  and  Norfolk,  added  to  the  sound 
doctrine  and  unanswerable  reasoning  contained  in  the  pam- 
phlet "  Common  Sense,'  will  not  leave  numbers  at  a  loss  to  de- 
cide on  the  propriety  of  a  separation." 

That  Paine  possessed  a  very  superior  degree  of  mechanical 
skill,  his  model  for  iron-bridges,  abundantly  proves.  That 
his  genius  for  poetry  lacked  but  cultivating,  I  think  will  suffi- 
ciently appear  from  the  following  little  efifusion,  extracted 
from  his  correspondence  with  a  lady,  afterwards  the  wife  of 
Sir  Robert  Smith  : — 


FROM  "  THE  CASTLE  IN  THE  AIR,"  TO  THE  "  LITTLE  CORKER  OF  TH1 
WORLD." 

IN  the  region  of  clouds  where  the  whirlwinds  arise, 

My  castle  of  fancy  was  built  ; 
The  turrets  reflected  the  blue  of  the  skies, 

And  the  windows  with  sun-beams  were  gilt. 

The  rainbow  sometimes,  in  its  beautiful  state, 

Enamelled  the  mansion  around, 
And  the  figures  that  fancy  in  clouds  can  create, 

Supplied  me  with  gardens  and  ground. 

I  had  grottoes  and  fountains  and  orange  tree  groves, 

I  had  all  that  enchantment  has  told  ; 
I  had  sweet  shady  walks  for  the  gods  and  their  love% 

I  had  mountains  of  coral  and  gold. 


58  LIFE  OF  THOMAS  PAINE. 

But  a  storm  that  I  felt  not,  had  risen  and  rolled, 

"While  wrapt  in  a  slumber  I  lay  : 
And  when  I  looked  out  in  the  morning,  behold  I 

My  castle  was  carried  away. 

It  passed  over  rivers,  and  valleys,  and  groves — 

The  world,  it  was  all  in  my  view — 
I  thought  of  my  friends,  of  their  fates,  of  their  lovea, 

And  often,  full  often,  of  you. 

At  length  it  came  over  a  beautiful  scene, 

That  nature  in  silence  had  made  : 
The  place  was  but  small — but 't  was  sweetly  serene, 

And  chequered  with  sunshine  and  shade. 

I  gazed  and  I  envied  with  painful  good  will, 

And  grew  tired  of  my  seat  in  the  air : 
When  all  of  a  sudden  my  castle  stood  still. 

As  if  some  attraction  was  there. 

Like  a  lark  from  the  sky  it  came  fluttering  down, 

And  placed  me  exactly  in  view — 
When  who  should  I  meet,  in  this  charming  retreat, 

This  corner  of  calmness — but  you. 

Delighted  to  find  you  in  honor  and  ease, 

I  felt  no  more  sorrow  nor  pain  ; 
And  the  wind  coming  fair,  I  ascended  the  breeze, 

And  went  back  with  my  castle  again.' 

On  the  subject  of  the  simplicity  of  Mr.  Paine's  habits,  and 
his  general  amiability,  his  friend  Clio  Rickman  remarks  : — 

"  He  usually  rose  about  seven,  breakfasted  with  his  friend 
Choppin,  Johnson,  and  two  or  three  other  Englishmen,  and  a 
Monsieur  La  Borde,  who  had  been  an  officer  in  the  ci-devant 
garde  du  corps,  an  intolerable  aristocrat,  but  whose  skill  in 
mechanics  and  geometry  brought  on  a  friendship  between  him 
and  Paine  ;  for  the  undaunted  and  distinguished  ability  and 
firmness  with  which  he  ever  defended  his  own  opinions  when 
controverted,  do  not  reflect  higher  honor  upon  him  than  that 
unbounded  liberality  toward  the  opinion  of  others  which  con- 
stituted such  a  prominent  feature  in  his  character,  and  whicls 


PERIOD   THIRD,  59 

never  suffered  mere  difference  of  sentiment,  whether  political 
or  religious,  to  interrupt  the  harmonious  intercourse  of 
friendship,  or  impede  the  interchanges  of  knowledge  and  in- 
formation. 

After  breakfast  he  usually  strayed  an  hour  or  two  in  the 
garden,  where  he  one  morning  pointed  out  the  kind  of  spider 
whose  web  furnished  him  with  the,  first  idea  of  constructing 
his  iron  bridge  ;  a  fine  model  of  which,  in  mahogany,  is  pre- 
served at  Paris. 

The  little  happy  circle  who  lived  with  him  here  will  ever 
remember  these  days  with  delight :  with  these  select  friends 
he  would  talk  of  his  boyish  days,  play  at  chess,  whist,  piquet, 
or  cribbage,  and  enliven  the  moments  by  many  interesting 
anecdotes  :  with  these  he  would  sport  on  the  broad  and  fine 
gravel  walk  at  the  upper  end  of  the  garden,  and  then  retire 
to  his  boudoir,  where  he  was  up  to  his  knees  in  letters  and 
papers  of  various  descriptions.  Here  he  remained  till  dinner- 
time ;  and  unless  he  visited  Brissof's  family,  or  some  particu- 
lar friend  in  the  evening,  which  was  his  frequent  custom,  he 
joined  again  the  society  of  his  favorites  and  fellow-boarders, 
with  whom  his  conversation  was  often  witty  and  cheerful, 
always  acute  and  improving,  but  never  frivolous. 

Incorrupt,  straightforward,  and  sincere,  he  pursued  his 
political  course  in  France,  as  everywhere  else,  let  the  govern- 
ment or  clamor  or  faction  of  the  day  be  what  it  might,  with 
firmness,  with  clearness,  and  without  a  "  shadow  of  turn- 
ing." 

In  all  Mr.  Paine's  inquiries  and  conversations  he  evinced 
the  strongest  attachment  to  the  investigation  of  truth,  and  was 
always  for  going  to  the  fountain-head  for  information.  He 
often  lamented  we  had  no  good  history  of  America,  and  that 
the  letters  written  by  Columbus,  the  early  navigators,  and 
others,  to  the  Spanish  court,  were  inaccessible,  and  that  many 
valuable  documents,  collected  by  Philip  II.,  and  deposited  with 
the  national  archives  at  Simanca,  had  not  yet  been  promulga- 
ted. He  used  to  speak  highly  of  the  sentimental  parts  of  Ray- 
nal's  History." 

Of  course,  Mr.  Paine  did  not  escape  the  imputation  of 
being  "  immoral."  The  cry  of  "  immorality  "  and  "  licen- 
tiousness "  has  been  raised  against  every  one  who  has  ever 
proposed  a  social  system  different  from  the  prevailing  one, 
from  the  time  of  him  who  preferred  harlotry  to  phariseeism,  to 
that  of  Charles  Fourier. 

Luther  no  more  escaped  the  accusation  of  being  a  sensua- 


60  LIFE   OF   THOMAS   PAINE. 

list,  than  did  Thomas  Paine  ;  and  had  not  Milton  -written 
*  Paradise  Lost,"  and  professed  the  "  orthodox  "  religion,  his 
•"  Doctrine  and  Discipline  of  Divorce  "  would  have  placed  him 
on  the  same  historical  page  with  those  reformers  Dr.  T.  L. 
Nichols,  Dr.  E.  Lazarus,  and  Stephen  Pearl  Andrews.* 

Paine  did  not,  as  we  have  seen,  live  with  his  wife  ;  but  if 
he  refrained  from  sexual  intercourse,  it  must  have  been  be- 
cause he  was  afraid  of  what  the  world  might  say,  (a  suppo- 
sition too  absurd,  in  his  case,  to  be  entertained  for  a  moment) 
or  because  he  had  little  taste  for  amorous  pleasures  ;  or, 
lastly,  because  he  wanted  to  show  the  world  that  liberalism 
was  such  a  matter  of  moon-shine,  that  it  was  not  even  mimi- 

*  The  first  of  these  gentlemen  favored  mankind  with  "  Esoteric  Anthro- 
pology," and  "  Marriage  :  Its  History,"  &c.  The  second  is  the  author  of 
"  Love  vs.  Marriage  ;"  and  the  third  took  the  free  love  side  of  the  question 
in  the  famous  discussion  on  Marriage  and  Divorce  between  himself  and  the 
Hon.  Horace  Greeley,  and  is  author  of  "  The  Science  of  Society,"  and  several 
•other  progressive  works,  and  of  an  admirable  system  of  instruction  in  the 
French  language. 

It  is  difficult  to  see  how  a  person  of  Mr.  Greeley's  understanding  could 
have  taken  the  side  he  did  in  the  controversy  just  alluded  to,  and  also  in  the 
renewal  of  that  controversy  between  himself  and  the  Hon.  Robert  Dale 
Owen. 

That  monogamy,  like  polygamy,  has  served  a  useful  purpose,  every  one 
capable  of  tracing  progress,  can  of  course  see  ;  but  how  such  an  one  can  fail 
to  perceive  that  these  institutions  have  about  equally  become  worn  out,  and 
morbific  to  the  social  organism,  both  in  Western  Europe  and  the  United 
States,  is  to  me  somewhat  mysterious.  Are  not  those  crowning  curses,  (ex- 
cepting, of  course,  demagogism)  prostitution,  and  pauperism,  alarmingly  on 
the  increase?  And  does  not  the  former  flourish  most,  where  the  cords  of 
matrimony  are  drawn  the  tightest? 

But  the  fact  that  Mr.  Greeley  magnanimously  opened  the  columns  of 
"  The  Tribune  "  to  the  other  side  of  the  question,  shows  that  he  had  full  confi- 
dence in  the  arguments  on  his  side,  and  this  ought  to  dispel  all  doubts  as  to 
his  sincerity,  and  the  uprightness  of  his  intention.  It  is  only  hypocrites 
or  downright  fools,  who  wish  to  have  truth,  with  respect  to  religious  or  so- 
cial questions,  suppressed. 

Still,  I  respectfully  ask  you,  Mr.  Editor  of  "  The  New  York  Tribune,"— did 
you  during  your  visit  to  Mormondom:  observe  any  part  of  Salt  Lake^City, 
in  which  humanity  touched  a  lower  depth  than  that  to  which  it  sinks  in  our 
Five  Points,  and  in  the  vicinity  of  the  junction  of  Water-  and  Roosevelt- 
streets  ?  And  do  you  really  think,  that  even  in  the  harem  of  Brigham  Young, 
female  degradation  is  greater  than  in  the  New  York  palaces  of  harlotry  ? 
En  passant,  one  of  these  has  just  been  fitted  up,  the  furniture  alone  in  which 
cost  thirty  thousand  dollars !  Yet  New  York  is  almost  the  only  State  in 
the  Union,  wherein  exists  what  Mr.  Greeley  considers  orthodox  marriage- 
marriage,  from  the  bonds  of  which  there  is  no  escape,  except  through  the 
door  of  actual  adultery,  natural  death,  or  murder ;  often  by  poison,  but 
generally  through  the  infliction  of  mental  agony  ! 


PERIOD   THIRD.  61 

jal  to  what  a  religious  system  which  upholds  crucifixion  and 
rfelf-der  ial,  palms  of  on  its  dupes  for  "  virtue  ;"  that  liberal- 
ism has  no  virtue  of  its  own,  and  therefore  has  to  borrow  and 
adopt  that  the  very  basis  of  which  is  supernaturalistic  self- 
enslavement  ;  that  free-thinking  is  a  mere  speculative,  im- 
practicable, abstract  sort  of  freedom,  which  it  would  not  be 
"  virtuous  "  to  accompany  by  free  acting  ;  that  liberty,  even 
in  the  most  important  particular,  (as  all  physiologists  know) 
is  but  a  mere  figment  of  the  imagination,  over  which  to  de- 
bate or  hold  free  discussions  ;  or,  at  most,  to  write  songs, 
plays,  and  novels  about. 

But  what  is  most  worthy  of  remark  in  this  connection  is, 
that  had  the  discoverer  of  the  steam-engine,  or  of  the  electrical 
telegraph  been  a  very  Rochester,  or  Caesar  Borgia,  the  cir- 
cumstance would  not  have  been  mentioned  as  an  objection  to 
a  steam-boat  passage,  or  to  a  telegraphic  dispatch  ;  and  only 
when  sociology  is  rescued  from  the  wild  regions  of  the  specu- 
lative and  becomes  an  art,  will  it  have  a  rule  of  its  own  ;  a 
rule  which  will  free  att  the  natural  passions  from  the  shackles 
of  ignorance  of  how  to  beneficially  gratify  them. 

For  a  reason  which  will  presently  appear,  I  shall  now 
call  the  readers  attention,  to  the  letter  of  Joel  Barlow,  writ- 
ten in  answer  to  one  from  that  vilest  of  slanderers  and  rene- 
gados,  —  James  Cheethain.  This  letter  was  written  to  obtain 
information  ;  nay,  not  information,  but  what  might  be  tor- 
tured into  appearing  such,  with  a  view  to  sending  forth  to  a 
prejudiced  world,  that  tissue  of  falsehoods,  which  Cheetham 
had  the  audacity  to  palm  off  on  it  for  the  Life  of  Thomas 
Paine. 


To  JAMES  CHEETHAM. 
"SiR: 

I  have  received  your  letter  calling  for  information  re- 
lative to  the  life  of  Thomas  Paine.  It  appears  to  me  that 
this  is  not  the  moment  to  publish  the  life  of  that  man  in  this 
country.  His  own  writings  are  his  best  life,  and  these  are 
not  read  at  present. 

The  greatest  part  of  the  readers  in  the  United  States  will 
not  be  persuaded  as  long  as  their  present  feelings  last,  to  con- 
sider him  in  any  other  light  than  as  a  drunkard  and  a  deist. 
The  writer  of  his  life  who  should  dwell  on  these  topics,  to  the 
exclusion  of  the  great  and  estimable  traits  of  his  real  char- 
acter, might,  indeed,  please  the  rabble  of  the  age  who  do  not 
know  him  ;  the  book  might  sell  ;  but  it  would  only  tend  to 


62  LIFE   OF   THOMAS   PAINE. 

render  the  truth  more  obscure,  for  the  future  biographer  that 
it  was  before. 

But  if  the  present  writer  should  give  us  Thomas  Paine 
complete  in  all  his  character  as  one  of  the  most  benevolent  and 
disinterested  of  mankind,  endowed  with  the  clearest  percep- 
tion, an  uncommon  share  of  original  genius,  and  the  greatest 
breadth  of  thought ;  if  this  piece  of  biography  should  analyze 
his  literary  iaoors,  and  rank  him  as  he  ought  to  be  ranked 
among  the  brightest  and  most  undeviating  luminaries  of  the 
age  in  which  he  has  lived — yet  with  a  mind  assailable  by  flat- 
tery, and  receiving  through  that  weak  side  a  tincture  of  vanity 
which  he  was  too  proud  to  conceal ;  with  a  mind,  though 
strong  enough  to  bear  him  up,  and  to  rise  elastic  under  the 
heaviest  load  of  oppression,  yet  unable  to  endure  the  contempt 
of  his  former  friends  and  fellow-laborers,  the  rulers  of  the 
country  that  had  received  his  first  and  greatest  services — 
a  mind  incapable  of  looking  down  with  serene  compassion,  as 
it  ought,  on  the  rude  scoffs  of  their  imitators,  a  new  genera- 
tion that  knows  him  not  ;  a  mind  that  shrinks  from  their 
Bociety,  and  unhappily  seeks  refuge  in  low  company,  or  looks 
for  consolation  in  the  sordid,  solitary  bottle,  till  it  sinks  at 
last  so  far  below  its  native  elevation  as  to  lose  all  respect  for 
itself,  and  to  forfeit  that  of  his  best  friends,  disposing  these 
friends  almost  to  join  with  his  enemies,  and  wish,  though  from 
different  motives,  that  he  would  haste  to  hide  himself  in  the 
grave — if  you  are  disposed  and  prepared  to  write  his  life,  thus 
entire,  to  fill  up  the  picture  to  which  these  hasty  strokes  of 
outline  give  but  a  rude  sketch  with  great  vacuities,  your  book 
may  be  a  useful  one  for  another  age,  but  it  will  not  be  relished, 
nor  scarcely  tolerated  in  this. 

The  biographer  of  Thomas  Paine  should  not  forget  his 
mathematical  acquirements,  and  his  mechanical  genius.  His 
invention  of  the  iron  bridge,  which  led  him  to  Europe  in  the 
year  1787,  has  procured  him  a  great  reputation  in  that  branch 
of  science,  in  France  and  England,  in  both  which  countries 
his  bridge  has  been  adopted  in  many  instances,  and  is  now 
much  in  use. 

You  ask  whether  he  took  an  oath  of  allegiance  to  France. 
Doubtless,  the  qualification  to  be  a  member  of  the  convention 
required  an  oath  of  fidelity  to  that  country,  but  involved  in  ii 
no  abjuration  of  his  fidelity  to  this.  He  was  made  a  French 
citizen  by  the  same  decree  with  Washington,  Hamilton,  Priest- 
ley, and  Sir  James  Mackintosh. 

What  Mr.  M has  told  you  relative  to  the  circum- 


PERIOD   THIRD.  63 

stances  of  his  arrestation  by  order  of  Robespierre,  is  erro- 
neous, at  least  in  one  point.  Paine  did  not  lodge  at  the  house 
where  he  was  arrested,  but  had  been  dining  there  with  some 

Americans,  of  whom  Mr.  M -  may  have  been  one.     I 

never  heard  before,  that  Paine  was  intoxicated  that  night. 
Indeed  the  officers  brought  him  directly  to  my  house,  which 
was  two  miles  from  his  lodgings,  and  about  as  much  from  the 
place  where  he  had  been  dining.  He  was  not  intoxicated 
when  they  came  to  me.  Their  object  was  to  get  me  to  go 
and  assist  them  to  examine  Paine's  paper.  It  employed  us  the 
rest  of  that  night,  and  the  whole  of  the  next  day  at  Paine's  lod- 
gings ;  and  he  was  not  committed  to  prison  till  the  next  evening. 

You  ask  what  company  he  kept — he  always  frequented 
the  best,  both  in  England  and  France,  till  he  became  the  ob- 
ject of  calumny  in  certain  American  papers  (echoes  of  the 
English  court  papers),  for  his  adherence  to  what  he  thought 
the  cause  of  liberty  in  France,  till  he  conceived  himself  neg- 
lected, and  despised  by  his  former  friends  in  the  United 
States.  From  that  moment  he  gave  himself  very  much  to 
drink,  and.  consequently,  to  companions  less  worthy  of  his 
better  days. 

It  is  said  he  was  always  a  peevish  person— this  is  possible. 
So  was  Lawrence  Sterne,  so  was  Torquato  Tasso,  so  was  J.  J. 
Rousseau  ;*  but  Thomas  Paine,  as  a  visiting  acquaintance  and 
as  a  literary  friend,  the  only  points  of  view  in  which  I  knew 
him,  was  one  of  the  most  instructive  men  I  ever  have  known. 
He  had  a  surprising  memory  and  brilliant  fancy  ;  his  mind  was 
a  storehouse  of  facts  and  useful  observations  ;  he  was  full  of 
lively  anecdote,  and  ingenious  original,  pertinent  remark  upon 
almost  every  subject. 

He  was  always  charitable  to  the  poor  beyond  his  means,  a 
sure  protector  and  friend  to  all  Americans  in  distress  that 
he  found  in  foreign  countries.  And  he  had  frequent  occasions 
to  exert  his  influence  in  protecting  them  during  the  revolu- 
tion in  France.  His  writings  will  answer  for  his  patriotism, 
and  his  entire  devotion  to  what  he  conceived  to  be  the  best 
interest  and  happiness  of  mankind. 

This,  sir.  is  all  I  have  to  remark  on  the  subject  you  mention. 
Now  I  have  only  one  request  to  make,  and  that  would  doubt 
less  seem  impertinent,  were  you  not  the  editor  of  a  news- 

*  The  peevishness  of  the  famous  Dr.  Samuel  Johnson  is  notorious  ;  and 
David,  the  "  man  after  God's  own  heart,"  was  so  inveterately  peevish  IK  to 
ring,  whilst  he  forced  the  sweet  tones  of  his  harp  to  accompany  the  spiteful 
canticle,  '•  All  men  are  liars.' 


64  LIFE   OF   THOMAS   PAINE. 

paper  ;  it  is,  that  you  will  not  publish  my  letter,  nor  permit  a 
copy  of  it  to  be  taken. 

I  am,  sir,  &c., 

JOEL  BARLOW. 
KALORAMA,  August  11,  1809." 

<;  Mr.  Barlow,"  says  Mr.  Vale,  "  was  in  France  at  the 
time  of  Mr.  Paine's  death,  and  knew  not  his  habits.  Cheet- 
ham  wrote  to  him,  informed  him  of  his  object,  mentioned  that 
Paine  was  drunken  and  low  in  his  company  towards  the  latter 
years  of  his  life,  and  says  he  was  informed  that  he  was  drunk 
when  taken  to  prison  in  JYance.  Now  Mr.  Barlow  does  not 
contradict  Cheetham ;  he  could  not,  as  Cheetham  had  the 
better  opportunity  of  knowing  facts,  and  Mr.  Barlow  does 
not  suspect  him  of  falsehood  ;  as  who  would  ?  He  therefore 
presumes  Mr.  Cheetham  correct  in  the  statement,  and  goes 
on,  not  to  excuse  Paine,  but  to  present  his  acknowledged 
good  qualities  as  a  set-off.  Then  Cheetham  publishes  this 
letter,  and  presents,  to  a  cursory  reader,  Mr.  Joel  Barlow  as 
acknowledging  Mr.  Paine's  intemperance,  and  other  infirmi- 
ties, which  had  no  other  foundation  than  Cheetham's  decla- 
ration, given  to  deceive  Barlow  ;  who  afterwards,  as  we  have 
seen,  gives  Barlow's  letter  to  deceive  the  public." 

The  late  Mr.  D.  Burger,  a  respectable  watch  and  clock 
maker  in  the  city  of  New  York,  and  who,  when  a  boy,  was 
clerk  in  the  store  which  furnished  Mr.  Paine's  groceries,  person- 
ally assured  the  writer  of  this,  that  all  the  liquor  which  Mr. 
Paine  bought,  both  for  himself  and  his  friends,  at  a  time,  too, 
when  drinking  was  fashionable,  was  one  quart  a  week. 

Before  returning  to  the  thread  of  this  narrative,  I  will 
call  the  attention  of  the  reader  to  the  following  letter,  from 
Mr.  Jefferson,  written  to  Mr.  Paine,  in  answer  to  one  which 
the  latter  wrote  to  him,  from  Paris  : — 

"  You  express  a  wish  in  your  letter  to  return  to  America 
by  a  national  ship  ;  Mr.  Dawson,  who  brings  over  the  treaty, 
and  who  will  present  you  with  this  letter,  is  charged  with 
orders  to  the  captain  of  the  Maryland  to  receive  and  accomo- 
date  you  back,  if  you  can  be  ready  to  depart  at  such  a  short 
warning.  You  will  in  general  find  us  returned  to  sentiments 
worthy  of  former  times  ;  in  these  it  will  be  your  glory  to  have 
steadily  labored,  and  with  as  much  effect  as  any  man  living. 
That  you  may  live  long  to  continue  your  useful  labors,  and 
reap  the  reward  in  the  thankfulness  of  nations,  is  my  sincere 


PERIOD  THIRD.  65 

prayer.  Accept  the  assurances  of  my  high  esteem,  and  affection- 
ate attachment. 

THOMAS  JEFFERSON." 


Mr.  Jefferson  had,  during  the  election  campaign  which 
seated  him  in  the  presidential  chair,  been  pronounced  an  in- 
fidel ;  and,  says  Randall,  in  his  "  Life  of  Jefferson"  "  It  was 
asserted  in  the  Federal  newspapers  generally,  and  preaclied 
from  a  multitude  of  pulpits,  that  one  of  the  first  acts  of  the 
President,  after  entering  office,  was  to  send  a  national  vessel 
to  invite  and  bring  '  Tom  Paine '  to  America." 

"  Paine  was  an  infidel,"  continues  Randall.  "  He  had 
written  politically  against  Washington.  He  was  accused  of 
inebriety,  and  a  want  of  chastity,  [of  the  truth  of  both  which 
accusations  Randall  strongly  indicates  his  unbelief.]  But  he 
was  the  author  of  "  Common  Sense  "  and  the  "  Crisis." 

On  the  occasion  of  Paine's  writing  to  Jefferson,  that  he 
was  coming  to  visit  him  at  Monticello,  Randall  again  re- 
marks : —  "Mrs.  Randolph,  and  we  think  Mrs.  Epps,  both 
daughters  of  the  Church  of  England,  were  not  careful  to 
conceal  that  they  would  have  much  preferred  to  have  Mr. 
Paine  stay  away.  Mr.  Jefferson  turned  to  the  speaker  with 
his  gentlest  smile,  and  remarked  in  substance :  "  Mr.  Paine 
is  not,  I  believe,  a  favorite  among  the  ladies — but  he  is  too 
well  entitled  to  the  hospitality  of  every  American,  not  to 
cheerfully  receive  mine."  Paine  came,  and  remained  a  day  or 
two,  ****  and  left  Mr.  Jefferson's  mansion,  the  subject  of 
lighter  prejudices,  than  when  he  entered  it." 

Mr.  Paine  was  to  have  accompanied  Mr.  Monroe  back  to 
the  United  States,  but  was  unable  to  complete  his  arrange- 
ments in  time.  This  was  fortunate  ;  for  the  vessel  in  which 
the  American  minister  embarked  was,  on  her  passage,  boarded 
by  a  British  frigate,  and  thoroughly  searched  for  the  author 
of  "  The  Rights  of  Man."  Paine  then  went  to  Havre  ;  but 
finding  that  several  British  frigates  were  cruising  about  the 
port,  he  returned  to  Paris. 

Seeing  himself  thus  baulked,  he  wrote  to  Mr.  Jefferson, 
as  before  stated,  for  assistance,  which  produced  the  letter 
above  copied.  He  did  not,  however,  for  some  cause  or  other, 
take  passage  in  the  Maryland.  He  next  agreed  to  sail  with 
Commodore  Barney,  but  was  accidentally  detained  beyond 
the  time,  and  the  vessel  in  which  he  was  to  have  embarked, 
was  lost  at  sea. 


66  LIFE  OF  THOMAS  PAINE. 

In  addition  to  these  remarkable  preservations,  Paine,  in 
1805,  was  shot  at  through  the  window  of  his  own  house,  at 
New  Rochelle,  and  escaped  unharmed  ;  also  the  privateer  in 
which,  but  for  the  interference  of  his  father,  (as  we  have 
seen)  he  would,  when  a  youth,  have  sailed,  lost  174  out  of  her 
crew  of  200  men,  in  a  single  battle  ;  and  when  he  was  in 
prison,  as  has  already  been  related,  he  missed  going  to  the 
guillotine,  in  consequence  of  the  jailor,  whose  business  it  was 
to  put  the  death-mark  on  the  cell  doors  of  the  doomed,  not 
noticing  that  the  door  of  the  cell  which  contained  the  author 
of  the  "  Age  of  Reason"  was  open  flat  against  the  wall,  so 
that  the  inside  was  marked  for  the  information  of  Paine,  in- 
stead of  the  outside  for  the  instruction  of  the  executioner.* 


*  "  But  in  this  set  of  ;Tumbrils  [the  dung-carts  in  which  the  victims  of 
the  Reign  of  Terror  were  dragged  to  execution]  there  are  two  other  things 
notable  :  one  notable  person  ;  and  one  want  of  a  notable  person .  The  no- 
table person  is  Lieutenant-General  Loiserolles.  a  nobleman  by  birth,  and  by 
nature  ;  laying  down  his  life  here  for  his  son.  In  the  prison  of  Saint-Lazare, 
the  night  before  last,  hurrying  to  the  gate  to  hear  the  death-list  read,  he 
caught  the  name  of  his  son.  The  son  was  asleep  at  the  moment.  "  I  am 
Loiserolles,"  cried  the  old  man  ;  at  Tinville's  bar,  an  error  in  the  Christian 
name  is  little  ;  small  objection  was  made. — The  want  of  the  notable  person, 
again,  is  that  of  Deputy  Paine !  Paine  has  sat  in  the  Luxembourg  since 
January ;  and  seemed  forgotten ;  but  Fouquier  had  pricked  him  at  last. 
The  Turnkey,  list  in  hand,  is  marking  with  chalk  the  outer  doors  of  to-mor- 
row's Fournee.  Paine's  outer  door  happened  to  be  open,  turned  back  on 
the  wall ;  the  Turnkey  marked  it  on  the  side  next  him,  and  hurried  on ;  an- 
other Turnkey  came,  and  shut  it ;  no  chalk-mark  now  visible,  the  Fournee 
went  without  Paine.  Paine's  life  lay  not  there." — Carlyle. 

Fouquier  Tinville,  above  alluded  to,  was  the  head  juryman  of  the  Revo- 
lutionary Tribunal.  He  was  far  more  blood-thirsty  than  was  Robespierre 
himself.  Was  not  the  proof  of  his  atrocities  indubitable,  it  would  be  impos- 
sible to  believe  that  such  horrors  ever  took  place.  Yet  such  a  "  man  of 
principle,"  and  so  incorruptible  was  this  horrible  wretch,  that,  says  Allison, 
"women,  the  pleasures  of  the  table,  or  of  the  theatre,  were  alike  indifferent 
to  him.***  He  might  during  the  period  of  his  power,  have  amassed  an  im- 
mense fortune ;  he  remained  to  the  last  poor,  and  his  wife  is  said  to  have 
died  of  famine.  His  lodgings  were  destitute  of  every  comfort ;  their  whole 
furniture,  after  his  death,  did  not  sell  for  twenty  pounds.  No  seduction 
could  influence  him."  I  will  add,  so  muck  for  principle.  FOUQUIER  TIN- 
VILLE WAS,  PAST  ALL  QUESTION,  VIRTUOUS,  HONEST,  SINCERE,  CONSCIEN- 
TIOUS. Had  this  miserable  victim  of  the  crudest  and  hardest  to  be  got 
rid  of  delusion  that  mankind  were  ever  infatuated  with,  been  as  destitute 
of  all  "virtuous"  qualities  as  was  Alexander  VI.,  he  could,  at  worst,  have  been 
bought  off,  and  would  probably  not  have  perpetrated  a  tithe  of  the  evil  he 
did.  He  at  last,  like  Robespierre,  "  sealed  his  testimon)  '  on  the  scaffold. 

The  French,  like  ourselves,  had  been  taught  to  venerate  a  religious  sys- 
tem whi  ?h  deifies  that  crowning  atrocity,  crucifixion  to  satisfy  justice !  and 


PERIOD   THIBD.  67 

Had  a  missionary  of  superstition  been  thus  preserved,  how  the 
hand  of  "  God  "  would  have  been  seen  in  the  matter. 

He  at  last  sailed  from  Havre,  on  the  1st  of  September, 
1802,  and  arrived  at  Baltimore,  on  the  30th  of  October,  fol- 
lowing. 

From  Baltimore  he  went  to  Washington,  where  he  was 
kindly  received  by  the  President,  Thomas  Jefferson.  This 
gentleman  thought  so  highly  of  him,  that  a  few  days  before 
MB  arrival,  he  remarked  to  a  friend, — "  If  there  be  an  office 
in  my  gift,  suitable  for  him  to  fill,  I  will  give  it  to  him  ;  I 
will  never  abandon  old  friends  to  make  room  for  new  ones." 
Jefferson  was  one  of  the  few  among  Paine's  illustrious  friends, 
who  never  joined  the  priest  ridden  multitude  against  him. 
He  corresponded  with  him  up  to  the  time  of  his  death. 

Mr.  Paine  was  now  between  sixty  and  seventy  years  of 
age,  yet  vigorous  in  body,  and  with  a  mind  not  at  all  im- 
paired. 

Of  the  manner  in  which  he  was  generally  received  on  his 
return  to  the  United  States,  we  can  form  a  very  fair  judg- 

which  consequently  canonizes  daily  and  hourly  self-crucifixion.  In  all  can- 
dour I  ask,  was  not  practical  faith  in  the  guillotine  the  natural  result  ?  and 
are  not  war,  duelling,  torturing,  hanging,  imprisoning :  together  with  blam- 
ing and  despising  our  unfortunate  fellow  creatures  as  vicious, — as  less  holy 
than  our  stupid  selves,  the  practical  logic  of  "  virtue  "  and  "  principle  ?" 
And  were  not  Marat,  Joseph  Lebon,  St.  Just,  Robespierre,  Tinville,  and  the 
rest  of  that  ilk,  the  tools — the  agents — the  faithful  servants,  and  finally  the 
victims  of  the  supernaturalistically  educated  and  virtuously  inclined  majority! 
The  arch  tyrant  who  was  at  the  bottom  of  all  this.  I  shall  take  in  hand 
presently,  and  show  how  to  conquer ;  ay,  annihilate  him. 

If  the  grand  truth  was  taught  us  from  our  cradles,  that  we  can  no  more 
expect  weil-doing  without  the  requisite  materialistic  conditions,  than  we  can 
expect  a  watch  to  keep  time  except  on  condition  that  every  wheel  and  spring 
shall  be  in  artistic  harmony  with  each  other,  where  would  be  malice  !  And 
if  we  practiced  in  accordance  with  this  grand  truth,  where  would  be  either 
wholesale  or  retail  murder  ?  where  would  be  wrong  of  any  description  ? 

"  I  don't  know  about  that,"  methinks  I  hear  the  mildest  of  the  old  fogiei 
exclaim.  Well,  my  dear  fellow  biped,  I'll  tell  you  one  thing  you  do  most 
assuredly  feel  to  be  true ;  and  you  know  it  to  be  true,  as  sure  as  you  are  ca- 
pable of  the  slightest  connection  of  ideas.  It  is  this.  The  present  method 
of  reforming  the  world,  has,  since  the  most  barbarous  age,  never  done  aught 
but  make  it  a  great  deal  worse.  Are  people  more  honest  or  less  gallant 
now  than  they  ever  were  ?  And  if  civilized  nations  are  not  quite  so  cruel, 
especially  in  war  time,  as  are  savages,  is  not  that  clearly  traceable  to  science 
and  art?  Show  me  where  man  is  least  cruel,  and  I  will  show  you  where 
"  suptfrnaturalism."  the  synonym  for  ignorance,  and  the  very  basis  of  "  vir- 
tue," principle,  and  moralism,  has  lost  the  most  ground,  and  where  science 
an<?  art  have  gained  the  most 


88  LIFE   OP  THOMAS  PAINE. 

inent  from  the  following  letter  to  his  friend,  Clio  Rick- 
man  : — 

"  MY  DEAR  FRIEND  : 

Mr.  Monroe,  who  is  appointed  minister  extraordinary  to 
France,  takes  charge  of  this",  to  be  delivered  to  Mr.  Este, 
banker  in  Paris,  to  be  forwarded  to  you. 

I  arrived  at  Baltimore  30th  October,  and  you  can  have 
no  idea  of  the  agitation  which  my  arrival  occasioned.  From 
New  Hampshire  to  Georgia  (an  extent  of  1500  miles),  every 
newspaper  was  filled  with  applause  or  abuse. 

My  property  in  this  country  has  been  taken  care  of  by  my 
friends,  and  is  now  worth  six  thousand  pounds  sterling ; 
which  put  in  the  funds  will  bring  me  £400  sterling  a  year. 

Remember  me  in  friendship  and  affection  to  your  wife  and 
family,  and  in  the  circle  of  our  friends. 

Yours  in  friendship, 

THOMAS  PAINE." 

With  respect  to  the  course  which  Mr.  Paine  intended,  for 
the  future,  to  pursue,  he  says  : — 

I  have  no  occasion  to  ask,  nor  do  I  intend  to  accept,  any 
place  or  office  in  the  government. 

There  is  none  it  could  give  me  that  would  in  any  way  be 
equal  to  the  profits  I  could  make  as  an  author,  (for  I  have  an 
established  fame  in  the  literary  world)  could  I  reconcile  it  to 
my  principles  to  make  money  by  my  politics  or  religion ;  I 
must  be  in  everything  as  I  have  ever  been,  a  disinterested 
volunteer  :  my  proper  sphere  of  action  is  on  the  common  floor 
of  citizenship,  and  to  honest  men  I  give  my  hand  and  my  heart 
freely. 

I  have  some  manuscript  works  to  publish,  of  which  I  shall 
give  proper  notice,  and  some  mechanical  affairs  to  bring  for- 
ward, that  will  employ  all  my  leisure  time." 

From  Washington,  Mr.  Paine  went  to  New  York,  and 
put  up  at  the  City  Hotel,  where  the  mayor  and  De  Witt 
Clinton  called  on  him ;  and,  notwithstanding  the  influence  of 
the  emissaries  of  superstition  and  their  dupes,  he  was  honored 
with  a  public  dinner,  by  a  most  respectable  and  numerous 
party  ;  and  it  is  worthy  of  remark  that  Cheetham,  then  edi- 
tor of  a  democratic  daily  paper,  was  particularly  officious  in 
helping  to  make  the  arrangements. 

In  respect  to  Chatham's  fictions  about  the  slovenlmess 


PERIOD   THIRD.  69 

of  Mr.  Paine,  if  there  had  been  any  truth  in  his  assertions, 
would  not  his  most  intimate  friends,  such  as  De  Witt  Clin- 
ton, the  mayor  of  New  York,  and  Mr.  Jarvis,  have  noticed 
it  ?  The  truth  about  this  is,  that  Mr.  Paine,  though  always 
clean,  was  as  cardess  in  his  dress  as  were  Napoleon  and  Fre- 
deric the  Great ;  and  almost  as  lavish  of  his  snuff.  We  have 
the  positive  and  very  respectable  testimony  of  Mr.  John  Fel- 
lows, that  Mr.  Paine's  slovenliness  went  no  further  than  this, 

But  the  sun  of  liberty  had  now  so  evidently  passed  meri- 
dian in  America,  that  most  of  the  leading  politicians  of  the 
day  considered  it  for  their  interests  to  turn  their  backs  on 
Mr.  Paine  ;  this  threw  the  great  martyr  to  the  cause  of  free- 
dom into  the  society  of  a  class  of  people  with  better  hearts, 
and  except  in  respect  of  political  gambling  and  fraud,  with 
sounder  heads. 

Among  this  class  was  a  respectable  tradesman,  a  black- 
smith and  veterinary  surgeon,  of  the  name  of  Carver.  When 
a  boy,  he  had  known  Paine,  who  also,  recollected  him  by 
some  little  services  which  Carver  reminded  him  that  he  had 
performed  for  him  at  Lewes,  in  Sussex,  England  ;  such,  for 
instance,  as  saddling  his  horse  for  him.  Mr.  Carver  was 
comfortably  situated,  and  was  honest  and  independent  enough 
to  openly  avow  the  religious  opinions  of  the  author  of  the 
"  Age  of  Reason."  Paine  boarded  at  his  house  some  time 
before  going  to  live  at  New  Rochelle. 

In  a  fit  of  anger,  however,  the  unsuspicious  Mr.  Carver 
afterwards  became  the  tool  of  Cheetham  ;  'a  circumstance 
which  he  (Carver)  sorely  regretted  to  the  day  of  his  death. 

I  once  met  him  at  a  celebration  of  Paine  s  birth-day,  and 
shall  never  forget  the  anxiety  which  the  venerable  old  gen- 
tleman exhibited  to  do  away  with  the  wrong  impression 
which  the  great  libeller  of  Mr.  Paine  had  betrayed  him  into 
making  on  the  public  mind.  The  circumstances  were,  in 
short,  these  :  Carver  had  presented  a  bill  for  board  to  Mr. 
Paine,  which  the  latter  (who,  as  truly  generous  people  usually 
are,  was  very  economical)  considered  exorbitant,  and,  there- 
fore, hastily  proposed  paying  off-hand,  and  having  nothing 
more  to  do  with  Carver.  Carver  would  probably  not  have 
presented  any  bill  at  all,  had  he  not  been,  just  then,  in  rather 
straightened  circumstances,  and  at  the  same  time  aware  that 
Mr.  Paine  was  in  affluence.  He  got  into  a  passion  at  the 
manner  in  which  Mr.  Paine  treated  his  claim,  wrote  him  some 
angry  letters,  and  unfortunately  kept  copies  of  them  ;  which 
Cheetham,  without  letting  him  know  what  use  he  intended 


TO  LIFE   OF   THOMAS   PAINE. 

to  make  of  them,  managed  to  get  hold  of,  and  publish  after 
Mr.  Paine's  death,  though  the  difficulty  which  elicited  them- 
had  been  immediately  and  amicably  adjusted  between  the 
parties  concerned. 

This  piece  of  chicanery,  however,  cost  Cheetham  a  convic- 
tion for  libel  on  Madam  Bonneville,  who  had  been,  though  only 
by  inuendo,  mentioned  in  the  letters  aforesaid,  in  a  manner 
which  society,  in  its  present  state  of  wisdom,  pleases  to  consi^ 
der  scandalous. 

When  Mr.  Paine  went  to  New  Rochelle,  he  boarded  with 
Mr.  Purdy,  who  lived  on  his  farm.  He  offered  Madam 
Bonneville  and  her  two  sons  his  small  farm  at  Bordentown. 
But  that  rural  retreat  was  so  different  from  Paris,  that  she 
chose  to  remain  in  New  York,  where  she  taught  French 
occasionally,  but  was  almost  wholly  supported  by  Mr. 
Paine. 

Madam  Bonneville,  though  generally  amiable,  sometimes 
contracted  debts  which  Mr.  Paine  conceived  unnecessary. 
She  furthermore,  says  Mr.  Vale,  "  did  not  scruple  to  send 
bills  in  to  him  which  he  had  not  sanctioned."  To  check  which 
propensity,  Mr.  Paine  once  allowed  himself  to  be  sued  by  a 
Mr.  Wilburn,  for  a  debt  of  thirty-five  dollars  for  her  board  ; 
but  after  nonsuiting  the  plaintiff,  he  paid  the  debt.  As  a 
proof  that  there  was  never  any  serious  quarrel  between  Mr. 
Paine  and  Madam  Bonneville,  that  lady,  her  husband  and  fam- 
ily were,  as  we  shall  presently  see,  Mr.  Paine's  principal 
legatees. 

To  oblige  his  friends,  Mr.  Paine  after  a  while  left  his 
farm  at  New  Rochelle,  and  went  back  to  Carver's  to  board  ; 
where  he  remained  till  he  took  up  his  residence  at  the  house 
of  Mr.  Jarvis,  the  celebrated  painter,  who  relates  the  folow- 
ing  anecdote  of  his  guest : 

"  One  afternoon,  a  very  old  lady,  dressed  in  a  large  scar- 
let cloak,  knocked  at  the  door,  and  inquired  for  Thomas 
Paine.  Mr.  Jarvis  told  her  he  was  asleep.  '  I  am  very  sor- 
ry,' she  said,  '  for  that,  for  I  want  to  see  him  very  particular- 
ly.' Thinking  it  a  pity  to  make  an  old  woman  call  twice, 
Mr.  Jarvis  took  her  into  Paine's  bed-room  and  waked  him. 
He  rose  upon  one  elbow,  and  then,  with  an  expression  of  eye 
that  staggered  the  old  woman,  back  a  step  or  two,  he  ask- 
ed— '  What  do  you  want  ?' — '  Is  your  name  Paine  ?' — '  Yes.' 
Well  then,  I  come  from  Almighty  God,  to  tell  you,  that  if 
you  do  not  repent  of  your  sins  and  believe  in  our  blessed  Sa- 
viour Jesus  Chr'st,  you  will  be  damned,  and  ' 


PERIOD   THIRD.  71 

poh,  it  is  not  true.  You  were  not  sent  with  such  an  imper- 
tinent message.  Jarvis,  make  her  go  away.  Pshaw,  he 
would  not  send  such  a  foolish  old  woman  as  you  about  with 
his  messages.  Go  away.  Go  back.  Shut  the  door.  The 
old  lady  raised  both  her  hands,  kept  them  so,  and  without 
saying  another  word,  walked  away  in  mute  astonishment." 

In  1807,  Mr.  Paine,  now  in  the  seventieth  year  of  his  age, 
removed  to  the  house  of  Mr.  Hitt,  a  baker,  in  Broome-street, 
street.  Whilst  here,  he  {  ublished  "  An  Examination  of  the 
Passages  in  the  New  Testament,  quoted  from  the  Old.  and 
called  Prophecies  of  the  Coming  of  Jesus  Christ." 

Mr.  Paine  lived  in  Partition-street  successively  ;  and  af- 
terwards, in  Greenwich-street ;  but  becoming  too  feeble  to 
be  thus  moving  about  among  boarding  houses,  Madam  Bonne- 
ville,  in  May,  1809,  hired  for  his  accommodation  a  small 
house  in  Columbia-street,  where  she  attended  on  him  till  his 
death. 

Mr.  Paine  had  moved  from  house  to  house,  as  we  have 
seen,  not  because  he  had  not  ample  resources,  but,  partly  to 
oblige  his  friends,  and  partly  for  the  variety  it  afforded,  part- 
ly because  it  suited  his  plain  and  simple  habits,  and  partly 
because,  like  most  old  people,  he  had  become  a  little  too  fru- 
gal. 

Perceiving  his  end  approaching,  Mr.  Paine  applied  to 
Willit  Hicks,  an  influential  preacher  of  tie  Society  of  Friends, 
for  permission  to  be  buried  in  their  cemetary.  Mr.  Hicks 
laid  the  proposition  before  the  members  of  his  meeting,  who, 
to  their  eternal  disgrace  returned  a  negative  answer. 

Of  course,  the  author  of  "  Age  of  Reason,"  was  now  beset 
by  the  emissaries  of  superstition.  The  clergy  themselves  not 
being  aware  of  the  momentous,  eternal,  and  impregnable  ma- 
terialistic truth  which  the  folly  they  teach  encrusts,  were 
panic-struck  at  finding  the  battery  of  reason,  which  had 
proved  so  powerful,  under  Paine's  management,  against 
kings,  aimed  at  them,  and  by  the  same  skilful  engineer. 
They  therefore  spared  no  pains  which  malice  and  the  mean 
cowardice  which  a  "  consciousness  of  guilt "  inspires,  could 
invent,  to  get  up  some  show  of  materials,  out  of  which  to 
manufacture  a  recantation.  But  not  the  least  particle  of  any 
proof  of  what  they  sought  did  they  obtain  ;  all  the  pious 
tales  with  which  they  have  insulted  the  world  on  the  subject, 
are  sheer  fabrications.  Yet  the  Christian  judge  who  sen- 
tenced Cheetham  for  libel  on  account  of  one  of  these  wretch 
ed  impositions,  did  not  blush,  says  Mr.  Vale,  to  "  coinpli 


72  LIFE   OF  THOMAS  PAINE 

ment "  that  arch  impostor  for  having  by  the  very  act  for 
which  he  was  legally  compelled  to  condemn  him  to  pay  "  hea- 
vy damages  "  produced  a  work  useful  to  religion  !"  * 

Not  long  before  his  death,  Mr.  Paine,  in  the  course  of  con- 
versation with  his  friend  Jarvis,  at  whose  house  he  then  was, 
observed  :  "  Now  I  am  in  health,  and  in  perfect  soundness 
of  mind  ;  now  is  the  time  to  express  my  opinion."  He  then 
solemnly  declared  that  his  views,  as  set  forth  in  his  theologi- 
cal writings,  remained  the  same. 

The  late  Dr.  Manly,  on  the  occasion  of  my  calling  his  at- 
tention to  an  article  in  an  English  Encyclopedia  which  con- 
veyed the  idea  that  he  testified  to  Paine's  recantation,  assur- 
ed me  that  the  author  of  "  The  Age  of  Reason "  "  did  not 
recant ;"  and  the  Doctor  seemed  not  over  pleased,  that  his 
words  had  been  tortured  into  giving  the  impression  they  did. 
He  believed  that  Mr.  Paine's  last  words  were, — "  I  don't 
wish  to  hear  anything  more  about  that  man  ;"  in  answer  to 
the  question, — "  Do  you  wish  to  believe  in  Jesus  Christ  ?"  I 
think  I  remember  Dr.  Manly's  words  correctly,  though  Mr. 
Vale  says  that  the  answer  of  Paine,  as  reported  by  Dr.  Man- 
ly, was, — "  I  have  no  wish  to  believe  on  the  subject."  It 
will  be  perceived,  however,  that  there  is  no  material  differ- 
ence ;  and  that  Dr.  Manly  might,  on  two  several  occasions, 
and  at  wide  intervals,  have  stated  the  answer  in  both  ways  ; 
either  of  which,  conveys  essentially  the  same  meaning. 

On  one  occasion,  a  Methodist  preacher  obtruded  himself 
on  Mr.  Paine,  and  abruptly  told  him  that,  "  unless  he  repent- 
ed of  his  unbelief,  he  would  be  damned."  To  which,  the  al- 
most dying  man,  partly  rising  in  his  bed,  indignantly  answer- 
ed, that  if  he  was  able,  he  would  immediately  put  him  out  of 
the  room.  This  scene  is  related  by  Mr.  Willit  Hicks,  of 
whom  mention  has  already  been  made. 

The  clergy  condescended,  in  their  desperation  to  blacken 
the  character,  and  destroy  the  influence  of  him  who  they 
feared  would  otherwise  put  an  end  to  the  craft  by  which  they 
had  their  wealth,  to  make  use  of  means  which,  in  pity  to  poor 
human  nature,  would  I  gladly  consign  to  oblivion,  and  shall, 

*  From  a  "large  pamphlet,  entitled  "  Grant  Thorburn  and  Thomas 
Paine,  "  recently  put  forth  gratis  by  Mr.  Oliver  White,  I  learn  that  a  reli- 
gious publisher  in  New  York  has,  within  a  few  years  past,  had  to  pay  dam- 
ages for  a  malicious  article  aimed  at  the  character  of  Paine,  but  which  inci- 
dentally hit  somebody  else ;  which  article,  it  is  but  justice  to  the  publisher's 
memory  (for  he  is  now  dead)  to  say,  he  was  betrayed  into  publishing,  proba- 
bly without  any  ill  intention  on  his  part 


PERIOD   THIRD.  73 

r 

-therefore,  mention  only  some  prominent  cases.  I  have 
named  Cheetham,  as  he  was  a  public  character — an  editor. 
But  I  shall  in  mercy  let  the  names  of  the  private  individuals 
who  were  the  tools  which  the  priesthood  made  use  of  in  this 
connection,  sink  beneath  contempt ;  in  fact,  I  feel  not  alto- 
gether guiltless  of  sacrilege,  in  placing  the  name  of  any  one 
of  Thomas  Paine's  slanderers  in  the  same  volume  which  con- 
tains his. 

It  has  herein  been  indubitably  proven  that  the  first  part 
of  "  The  Age  of  Reason,"  the  first  of  Paine's  "  infidel "  pro- 
ductions, be  it  remembered,  was  written  in  1793  ;  and  that 
the  second  part  was  written  some  time  thereafter.  Franklin 
died  in  1790.  Yet  the  "  American  Tract  Society"  has  not 
scrupled  to  assert,  in  a  tract  entitled  "  Don't  Unchain  the 
Tiger,"  that  "  When  an  infidel  production  was  submitted — 
probably  by  Paine — to  Benjamin  Franklin,  in  manuscript, 
he  returned  it  to  the  author,  with  a  letter,  from  which  the 
following  is  extracted  :  "  I  would  advise  you  not  to  attempt 
UNCHAINING  THE  TIGER,  but  to  burn  this  piece  before  it  is  seen 
by  any  other  person"  "  If  men  are  so  wicked  with  religion , 
wJiat  would  tJiey  be  WITHOUT  it  ?" 

"  Think"  said  he  to  Paine,  in  a  letter,  to  which  allusion 
has  been  made,  "  how  many  inconsiderate  and  inexperienced 
jouth  of  both  sexes  there  are,  who  have  need  of  the  motives  of 
religion  to  restrain  them  from  vice,  to  support  their  virtue,  and 
retain  them  in  the  practice  of  it  tiU  it  becomes  habitual." 

It  will  be  perceived  that  the  above  pretended  extract  is 
given  as  though  it  was  verbatim  ;  though  from  a  letter  which, 
in  a  very  circuitous  manner,  and  one  most  ingeniously  calcu- 
lated to  deceive  is,  after  all,  confessed  to  be  only  "probably" 
written.  The  concluding  portion  of  the  extract,  is  given 
only  after  considerable  pious  dust  has  been  most  artistically 
thrown  in  the  eyes  of  the  more  prayerful  than  careful  reader. 
Here,  the  author  of  "  Don't  Unchain  the  Tiger,"  resolves  no 
longer  to  let  "  I  dare  not,  wait  upon  I  would,"  but  fully  de- 
clares, though  in  a  manner  that  would  do  credit  to  the  most 
trickish  Jesuit,  that  ever  mentally  reserved  the  truth,  that  the 
"  letter  to  which  mention  has  been  made,"  was  written  by 
FRANKLIN  to  Paine,  evidently,  as  all  can  see,  who  have  mas- 
tered the  second  rule  of  arithmetic,  three  years  after  the  death 
of  the  writer."  Yet  Protestants  laugh  at  Catholics,  for  swal- 
lowing transubstantiation. 

How  firmly  did  they  who  put  forth  "  Don't  Unchain 
The  Tiger,"  believe  in  revelation  ?  How  much  faith  had 


74  LIFE   OF   THOMAS  PAINE. 

they,  in  the  truth  of  a  book  wherein  it  is  printed,  that  "  God >f 
had  declared —  "  Liars  shall  have  their  part  in  the  lake  that 
burns  with  fire  and  brimstone  ?" 

Mark  this  "probably"  well.  There  is  in  it  such  an  ex- 
quisiteness  of  all  that  is  mean,  cowardly,  mendacious,  and  con- 
temptible. 

If  the  writer  of  "  Don't  Unchain  the  Tiger  "  ever  saw  any 
letter  from  which  he  extracted  what  he  pretends  he  has,  did 
not  that  letter  inform  him,  past  all  "  probably,"  and  before 
he  made  the  first  part  of  the  extract,  BY  whom,  and  TO  whom, 
it  was  written  ? 

Oh,  ye  priests !  How  low  are  ye  fallen !  What  lower 
depths  can  human  degradation  touch  ?  How  much  smaller 
can  you,  your  own  contemptible  selves,  suppose  the  intellect- 
ual calibre  of  your  poor  dupes  to  be  ?  What  satisfaction  can 
you  feel  in  the  reverence  of  those  whose  understandings  you 
thus  estimate  ? 

Compare  the  present  position,  in  the  social  organism,  of 
your  sincere  disciples,  with  that  which  they  occupied  when 
what  you  teach  was  the  highest  which  man  was  prepared  to 
receive. 

But  unless  my  memory  serves  me  very  badly,  this  "Tiger" 
tract  was  originally  published  without  the  "  probably  ;"  and 
unequivocally  named  the  "  Age  of  Reason."  I  recollect  wellr 
that  about  twenty-five  years  ago,  a  committee,  one  of  whom 
was  the  famous  infidel  lecturer,  the  late  Mr.  Benjamin  Offen, 
called  at  the  Tract  Society's  agency,  and  pointed  out  how 
impossible  it  was  that  this  "  Tiger"  publication  which  hailed 
from  thence,  could  be  true  ;  and  I  am  strongly  impressed  that 
this  miserable  "probably  "  has  been  the  result. 

Clergymen,  it  is  neither  in  malice  nor  anger,  but  with 
feelings  of  unfeigned  sorrow  and  pity,  that  I  use  such  lan- 
guage to  and  respecting  you.  I  have  not  a  wish  that  would 
not  be  gratified,  were  you  at  this  moment  at  the  head  of  man- 
kind, teaching  the  Jcnowable  ;  and  until  you  are  worthily  rein- 
stated in  youi  -rightful — your  natural  position  in  the  social 
organism,  violence,  fraud,  humbug — in  fine,  demagogism,  will 
there  revel,  and  you  will  be  its  degraded  purveyor.  How  do 
you  relish  the  impudence  with  which  demagogism  now  snubs 
you  back  to  the  "  supernatural,"  whenever  you  dare  utter  a 
practical  word  ? 

I  could  fill  twenty  pages  or  more  with  extracts,  many  of 
them  documentary,  from  previous  histories  of  Paine,  going  to 
prove  that  the  author  of  "  The  Age  of  Reason  "  never  recanted. 


PERIOD   THIRD.  75 

But  can  it  be  possible  that  those  who  possess  a  spark  of  rea- 
son, even,  can  consider  the  matter  of  the  slightest  consequence? 
The  question  of  the  truth  or  falsehood  of  a  proposition  is  a 
matter  for  the  judgment  to  decide.  Is  the  judgment  of  a  dying 
man  more  clear  than  that  of  a  perfectly  healthy  one  ?  Was 
there  ever  an  instance  known,  of  a  human  biped  being  so  big 
a  fool,  as  to  go  to  a  dying  man  for  advice  in  preference  to 
going  to  him  for  it  when  he  was  in  health,  where  any  Itnoivn 
value  was  concerned  ?  The  thing  is  too  absurd  to  waste  an- 
other word  upon  ;  and  I  have  noticed  it  at  all,  only  to  show 
to  what  meanness*  modern  priests  will  stoop  ;  to  what  miser- 
able shifts  the  corrupt  hangers  on  to  the  superanuated  and 
effete,  are  at  length  reduced.  At  this  day  the  wretched  for- 
tune-teller who  deals  out  supernaturalism  by  the  fifty  cents 
worth,  may  justly  feel  proud  by  the  side  of  the  archbishop — 
by  the  side  of  the  successors  of  those  who,  before  the  dawn  of 
science,  taught  the  highest  which  man  was  capable  of  receiv- 
ing, thus  starting  civilization  into  existence,  and  justly  be- 
coming mightier  than  kings.  But  the  time  is  fast  approach- 
ing when  they  will  teach  the  knowable  and  efficient,  and  re- 
sume their  natural  position,  that  of  the  head  of  the  social  or- 
ganism. Till  when,  confusion  will  keep  high  holiday,  folly 
be  rampant,  ignorance  supreme,  and  superstition  and  dema- 
gogism  will  be  rife.  The  case  is  as  clear  as  this  : —  Man 
comes  into  the  world  ignorant,  and  of  course  needs  teaching. 
Yet  what  has  been  palmed  off  on  man  for  elective  govern- 
ment, confessedly  but  represents  him.  The  clergy  professedly 
teach  him  ;  and  of  course,  when  they  teach  him  right,  as  they 
will  soon  find  out  that  it  is  immeasurably  more  for  their  own 
advantage  to  do,  than  it  is  to  teach  him  wrong,  all  will  be 
well.  The  human  race  will,  from  that  point  in  teaching, 
rapidly  develop  into  a  harmoniously  regulated  organism ;  a 
grand  being,  or  God,  to  whom  all  the  conceivable  and  de- 
sirable will  be  possible.  Each  individual  will  act  as  freely 
as  do  the  wheels  and  springs  of  a  perfect,  because  scientifically 
and  artistically,  and  harmoniously  regulated  time-keeper. 

At  whatever  stage  of  development  caucus-and-ballot-box- 
ism  takes  charge  of  man,  it  assumes  that  he  is,  in  the  main, 
wise  enough  already  ;  that  the  majority  is  the  fountain-head 
of  both  wisdom  and  power  ;  that  rulers  are  legitimately  but 
the  servants  of  the  ruled.  What  balderdash. 

The  only  government,  except  that  of  despotism  or  hum- 
bug, that  man  ever  has  had,  now  has,  or  ever  can  have,  was, 


76  LIFE   OP   THOMAS   PAINE. 

is,  and  must  be,  under  simple  nature,  that  of  science  and  art — 
that  of  teaching. 

"Let  me  make  the  people's  songs,  and  I  care  not  who 
makes  their  laws,"  said  Napoleon.  "  Let  me  make  the  peo- 
ple's cradle-hymns  and  Sunday-school  catechisms,"  say  I, 
"  and  I  will  defy  all  the  power  which  can  be  brought  against 
me  to  supplant  me  in  their  government,  except  by  adopting 
my  method." 

And  when  the  people's  cradle-hymns  and  Sunday  school 
catechisms  are  composed  by  those  who  qualify  themselves  to 
lead,  direct,  or  govern  mankind  by  science "  and  art,  and  who 
derive  human  law  from  the  whole  body  of  the  knowable,  in- 
stead of  from  the  wild '  regions  of  the  speculative,  and  from 
the  arbitrary  subjective,  the  world  will  be  delivered  from 
religious,  political,  social,  and  moral  quackery  ;  but  not  till 
then.  And  to  whomsoever  says  "  lo  here,"  "  lo  there,"  or  lo 
any  where  except  to  the  science  of  sciences  and  art  of  arts  ol 
how  to  be  free,  I  say,  and  appeal  for  my  justification,  to  the 
entire  past, — you  are  deceived  or  a  deceiver. 

If  the  world  was  not  deluded  with  the  idea  that  reason 
and  free  discussion  are  the  only  means  that  are  available 
against  priestcraft  and  statecraft,  it  would  long  since  have 
discovered  and  applied  the  true  remedy,  viz  :  to  seize  the 
citadel  of  the  infant  mind — of  education  ;  and  thus  institute 
a  religion  and  government  of  science  and  art,  in  place  of  a 
religion  of  mystery  and  a  government  of  despotism  and  hum- 
bug. False  religion  and  its  correlate — bad  government, 
must  be  prevented.  Whatever  religious  or  governmental  no- 
tions are  bred  into  man,  can  never  to  any  efficient  extent,  be 
got  out  of  him. 

Priestcraft  and  statecraft,  in  England  and  the  United 
States,  would  like  nothing  better  than  an  assurance,  that 
mankind's  reformers  would  henceforth  confine  their  efforts  to 
reason  and  free  discussion,  and  to  the  furtherance  of  educa- 
tion on  its  present  plan  in  all  our  schools  and  colleges.  Priest- 
craft and  statecraft  would  then  forever  be  as  safe  as  would  a 
well  regulated  army  among  undisciplined  savages,  who  did 
nothing  but  find  fault  with  their  oppressors ;  and  to  the  va- 
rious cliques  of  which  savages,  the  regulars  would  suggest  as 
many  various  plans  for  their  own  -(the'  regular's)  overthrow, 
for  them,  (the  savages)  to  discuss  over  and  divide  upon. 

In  one  of  the  most  purely  monarchical  countries  in  all 
Europe  (Germany)  common  school  and  collegiate  education 
prominently  form  one  of  the  government's  pet  projects. 


PERIOD   THIRD.  77 

In  England,  where  the  wheels  of  the  state  machinery 
mutually  neutralize  each  other's  action,  neither  monarchs  nor 
ecclesiastics  can  do  aught  but  keep  themselves  miserably 
rich,  and  the  great  body  of  the  people  wretchedly  poor. 

Free  discussion  and  reason  have  done  what  little  good  in 
church  and  state  affairs  it  was  their  function  to  do,  except  as 
will  be  hereinafter  mentioned  ;  anfl  they  are  now  in  both  Eng- 
land and  the  United  States,  but  the  safety-valve  which  pre- 
Tents  the  boiler  of  the  ecclesiastical  steam-engine  from  burst- 
ing ;  and  secures  political  despotism,  swindling,  and  corrup- 
tio*n,  from  having  to  do  any  thing  but  change  hands. 

Reason  and  free  discussion  are  now  the  fifth  wheel  of  the 
car  of  progress,  whose  useless  noise  and  comparatively  singu- 
lar appearance  diverts  attention  from  the  slow  ;  nay,  back- 
ward movement,  of  the  other  four  wheels,  and  thus  prevents 
any  change  for  the  better  being  made. 

If,  on  the  continent  of  Europe,  monarchs  and  the  Pope 
forbid  political  and  religious  free  discussion,  it  is  not  because 
they  are  afraid  that  the  first  will  lead  to  liberty,  or  the  sec- 
ond to  practical  wisdom.  They  are  perfectly  aware  that/ree 
talking  but  disturbs  political  and  religious  affairs  ;  and  would 
only  displace  themselves  who  are  well  seated  in,  and  have 
grown  fat  on,  religious  and  political  abuse,  to  make  way  for 
an  ungorged  shoal  of  political  and  ecclesiastical  leeches. 

Passing  lightly  over  the  pitiable  trash  which  in  the 
United  States  more  than  in  any  other  country  is  palmed  off 
on  the  multitude  for  knowledge,  look  at  our  higher  litera- 
ture. See  how  it  truckles  to  the  low,  and  narrow,  and  un- 
scientific views  which  confessedly  had  their  rise  when  man  was 
a  mere  savage.  Where,  throughout  the  United  States,  is  the 
magazine  which  has  the  liberal  and  independent  tone  of  the 
Westminster  Review,  which  hails  from  the  capital  of  mon- 
archy- governed  and  confessedly  church-taxed  England  ?  The 
most  independent  magazine  of  which  the  United  States  can 
boast,  is  the  "  Atlantic  Monthly  ;"  but  I  have  strong  misgiv- 
ings as  to  whether  they  whose  monied  interests  are  staked 
in  it  will  thank  me,  or  would  thank  any  one,  for  such 
praise. 

But  the  orthodox  clergy  are  already,  owing  almost  whol- 
ly to  what  mere  fractional  science  and  art  have  done,  the  laugh- 
ing-stock of  nearly  the  entire  scientific  world,  and  the  head- 
clergy  are  writhing  under  the  tortures  of  self-contempt,  in 
such  agony,  that  the  main  drift  of  their  preaching  is  to  try, 
without  arousing  their  dupes,  to  let  the  knowing  ones  (whom 


t78  LIFE   OF  THOMAS   PAINE. 

curiosity,  interest,  or  a  desperate  attempt  to  dispel  Sabbatical 
ennui  may  have  brought  into  their  congregations)  see  that 
they  are  not  the  fools  which  they,  for  bread  and  butter's  sake, 
pretend  to  be. 

The  following  extract  from  a  letter  of  Baron  Humboldt 
to  his  friend  Varnhagen  Yon  Ense,  is  a  fair  sample  of  the  con- 
tempt in  which  the  apostles*  of  mystery  are  held  by  men  of 
science : 

"  BERLIN,  March  21,  1842. 

"  My  dear  friend,  so  happily  restored  to  me !  It  is  a 
source  of  infinite  joy  to  me  to  learn,  from  your  exquisite  let- 
ter, that  the  really  very  delightful  society  of  the  Princess's 
has  benefited  you  physically,  and,  therefore,  as  I  should  say, 
in  my  criminal  materialism,  mentally  also.  Such  a  society, 
blown  together  chiefly  from  the  same  fashionable  world  of 
Berlin  (somewhat  flat  and  stale),  immediately  takes  a  new 
shape  in  the  house  of  Princess  Pueckler.  It  -is  like  the  spi- 
rit which  should  breathe  life  into  the  state ;  the  material 
seems  ennobled. 

"  I  still  retain  your  "  Christliche  Glaubenslehre,"  [a  cel- 
ebrated work  on  the  Christian  Dogma,  by  Dr.  David  Fried- 
rich  Strauss]  I  who  long  ago  in  Potsdam,  was  so  delighted 
with  Strauss's  Life  of  the  Saviour.*  One  learns  from  it  not 
only  what  he  does  not  believe,  which  is  less  new  to  me,  but 
rather  what  kind  of  things  have  been  believed  and  taught 
by  those  black  coats  (parsons)  who  know  how  to  enslave 
mankind  anew,  yea,  who  are  putting  on  the  armour  of  their 
former  adversaries." 

But  a  still  more  encouraging  aspect  of  the  case  is,  that  a 
knowledge  of  the  great  truth  is  rapidly  spreading,  that  all  in 
the  human  connection  is  a  vast  material  organism,  the  possible 
modifications  of  which  are  indicated  by  the  organ  of  its  high- 
est consciousness, — man  ;  and  that  the  whole  family  of  man 
is  a  grand  social  organism,  (however,  as  yet,  unjointed)  the 
well-being  of  every  part  of  which,  is  indispensable  to  that  of 
every  other  part.  But  more  of  this,  shortly. 

Mr.  Paine  suffered  greatly  during  his  last  illness,  (his  dis- 
ease being  dropsy,  attended  with  cough  and  constant  vomit- 

*  Humboldt's  Letters  to  Varnhagen  Von  Ense,  have  just  been  published 
by  Messrs.  Rudd  &  Carleton  :  and  Strauss'  Life  of  the  Saviour,  or,  to  give 
the  work  its  full  title,  "  The  Life  of  Jesus  Critically  Examined,"  is  published 
by  Calvin  Blanchard.  The  translation  is  by  Marian  Evans,  the  accomplished 
authoress;  of  Adam  Bede,  and  is  pronounced  by  Strauss  himself  to  be  moet 
elegantly  done  and  perfectly  correct 


PERIOD   THIRD.  79 

ing),  yet  his  mental  faculties  remained  unimpaired  to  the  last. 
On  the  8th  of  June.  1809,  about  nine  o'clock  in  the  forenoon, 
he  expired,  almost  without  a  struggle. 

I  have,  as  the  reader  has  seen,  noticed  some  of  the  little 
foibles  and  excentricities  of  Mr.  Paine  ;  not,  however,  that 
they  were  of  any  account,  but  simply  because  they  attest  that 
he  was  not  superhumanly  perfect*  that  he  was  not  that  ridi- 
culous cross  between  man  and  "  God/7  which  the  biographers 
of  Washington  have  placed  him  in  the  position  of  appearing 
to  be. 

Lovers  are  sure  to  have  their  petty  quarrels,  else,  they 
would  be  indifferent  to  each  other  ;  and  when  prejudice  shall 
be  done  away  with,  mankind  will  love  Thomas  Paine  none 
the  less  for  the  human  frailties  which  were  just  sufficient  to 
show  that  he  belonged  to  human  nature. 

The  day  after  Mr.  Paine's  death,  his  remains  were  taken 
to  New  Rochelle,  attended  by  a  few  friends,  and  there  buried 
on  his  farm  ;  and  a  plain  stone  was  erected,  with  the  follow- 
ing inscription : — 

THOMAS  PAINE, 

AUTHOR   OP   "  COMMON   SENSE." 

Died  June  8,  1809,  aged  seventy-two  years  and  jive,  months. 

Mr.  William  Cobbett  afterward  removed  the  bones  of 
Mr.  Paine  to  England. 

In  1839,  through  the  exertions  of  a  few  friends  of  the  lib- 
eral cause,  among  whom  Mr.  G.  Vale  was  very  active,  a  neat 
monument,  was  erected  over  the  grave  of  Mr.  Paine.  Mr. 
Frazee,  an  eminent  artist,  generously  volunteered  to  do  the 
sculpture.  This  monument  cost  about  thirteen  hundred  dol- 
lars. On  it  is  carved  a  representation  of  the  head  of  Mr. 
Paine,  underneath  which,  is  this  inscription 

THOMAS  PAINE, 

AUTHOR   OP 

COMMON  SENSE. 

Reader,  did  it  ever  occur  to  you,  that  all  the  crimes  which 
an  individmal  can  commit,  are  in  reality,  summed  up  in  the 
word  misfortune?  Such  is  the  fact.  Society,  therefore,  not 
altogether  without  reason,  however  regardless  of  justice,  con- 
siders nothing  more  disgraceful  than  misfortune  ;  and  hence  it 


80  LIFE   OP   THOMAS   PAINE 

is,  that  of  all  the  slanders  got  up  to  injure  the  reputation  of 
Mr.  Paine,  and  thus  prevent  his  influence,  none  have  been 
more  industriously  circulated,  and  none  have  proved  more 
successful,  than  those  which  represented  him  as  being  in  ex- 
treme poverty.  Without  further  remark,  therefore,  I  shall 
call  your  attention  to 

THE   WILL   OF   THOMAS   PAINE. 

"  The  People  of  the  State  of  New  York,  by  the  Grace  of  God. 
Free  and  Independent,  to  all  to  whom  these  presents  shall 
come  or  may  concern,  Send  Greeting  : 

Know  ye  that  the  annexed  is  a  true  copy  of  the  will  of 
Thomas  Paine,  deceased,  as  recorded  in  the  office  of  our  sur- 
rogate, in  and  for  the  city  and  county  of  New  York.  In  tes- 
timony whereof,  we  have  caused  the  seal  of  office  of  our  said 
surrogate  to  be  hereunto  affixed.  Witness,  Silvanus  Miller, 
Esq.,  surrogate  of  said  county,  at  the  city  of  New  York,  the 
twelfth  day  of  July,  in  the  year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand 
eight  hundred  and  nine,  and  of  our  independence  the  thirty- 
fourth.  SILVANUS  MILLER. 

The  last  will  and  testament  of  me,  the  subscriber,  Thomas 
Paine,  reposing  confidence  in  my  Creator  God,  and  in  no 
other  being,  for  I  know  of  no  other,  nor  believe  in  any  other, 
I,  Thomas  Paine,  of  the  State  of  New  York,  author  of  the 
work  entitled  '  Common  Sense,'  written  in  Philadelphia,  in 

1775,  and  published  in  that  city  the  beginning  of  January, 

1776,  which  awaked  America  to  a  Declaration  of  Indepen- 
dence, on  the  fourth  of  July  following,  which  was  as  fast  as 
the  work  could  spread  through  such  an  extensive  country  ; 
author  also  of  the  several  numbers  of  the  '  American  Crisis ' 
thirteen  in  all/  published  occasionally  during  the  progress  of 
the  revolutionary  war — the  last  is  on  the  peace ;  author  also 
of  the  '  Rights  of  Man/  parts  the  first  and  second,  written 
and  published  in  London,  in  1791,  and  '92  ;  author  also  of  a 
work  on  religion,  '  Age  of  Reason/  parts  the  first  and  second. 
'  N.  B.  I  have  a  third  part  by  me  in  manuscript  and  an  an- 
swer to  the  Bishop  of  Landaff ;'  author  also  of  a  work,  lately 
published,  entitled  '  Examination  of  the  passages  in  the  New 
Testament  quoted  from  the  Old,  and  called  prophesies  con- 
cerning Jesus  Christ/  and  showing  there  are  no  prophecies 
of  any  such  person  ;  author  also  of  several  other  works  not 
here  enumerated, '  Dissertations  on  the  first  Principles  of  Go- 
vernment/— '  Decline  and  Fall  of  the  English  System  of  Fi- 
nance ' — '  Agrarian  Justice"  etc.,  etc.,  make  this  my  last  will 


PERIOD  THIRD.  81 

and  testament,  <fcut  A$  to  say  :  I  give  and  bequeath  to  my  exe- 
cutors hereinafter  appointed,  Walter  Morton  and  Thomas  Ad- 
dis Emmet,  thirty  shares  1  hold  in  the  New  York  Phoenix  In- 
surance Company,  which  cost  me  1470  dollars,  they  are  worth 
now  upward  of  1500  dollars,  and  all  my  moveable  effects,  and 
also  the  money  that  may  be  in  my  trunk  or  elsewhere  at  the 
time  of  my  decease,  paying  thereout  the  expenses  of  my  fune- 
ral, in  trust  as  to  the  said  shares,  moveables,  and  money,  for 
Margaret  Brazier  Bonneville,  wife  of  Nicholas  Bonneville, 
of  Paris,  for  her  own  sole  and  separate  use,  and  at  her  own 
disposal,  notwithstanding  her  coverture.  As  to  my  farm  in 
New  Eochelle,  I  give,  devise,  and  bequeath  the  same  to  my 
said  executors,  Walter  Morton  and  Thomas  Addis  Emmet, 
and  to  the  survivor  of  them,  his  heirs  and  assigns  for  ever, 
in  trust,  nevertheless,  to  sell  and  dispose  of  the  north  side 
thereof,  now  in  the  occupation  of  Andrew  A.  Dean,  beginning 
at  the  west  end  of  the  orchard  and  running  in  a  line  with  the 

land  sold  to .Coles,  to  the  end  of  the  farm,  and  to  apply 

the  money  arising  from  such  sale  as  hereinafter  directed.  I 
give  to  my  friends,  Walter  Morton,  of  the  New  York  Phoenix 
Insurance  Company,  and  Thomas  Addis  Emmet,  counsellor- 
at-law,  late  of  Ireland,  two  hundred  dollars  each,  and  one 
hundred  dollars  to  Mrs.  Palmer,  widow  of  Elihu  Palmer,  late 
of  New  York,  to  be  paid  out  of  the  money  arising  from  said 
sale,  and  I  give  the  remainder  of  the  money  arising  from  that 
sale,  one  half  thereof  to  Clio  Rickman,  of  High  or  Upper 
Mary-la-bone  street,  London,  and  the  other  half  to  Nicholas 
Bonneville  of  Paris,  husband  of  Margaret  B.  Bonneville  afore- 
said :  and  as  to  the  south  part  of  the  said  farm,  containing 
upward  of  one  hundred  acres,  in  trust,  to  rent  out  the  same 
or  otherwise  put  it  to  profit,  as  shall  be  found  most  advis- 
able, and  to  pay  the  rents  and  profits  thereof  to  the  said  Mar- 
garet B.  Bonneville,  in  trust  for  her  children,  Benjamin 
Bonneville  and  Thomas  Bonneville,  their  education  and 
maintenance,  until  they  come  to  the  age  of  twenty-one  years, 
in  order  that  she  may  bring  them  well  up,  give  them  good 
and  useful  learning,  and  instruct  them  in  their  duty  to  God, 
and  the  practice  of  morality,  the  rent  of  the  land  or  the  in- 
terest of  the  money  for  which  it  may  be  sold,  as  hereinafter 
mentioned,  to  be  employed  in  their  education.  And  after 
the  youngest  of  the  said  children  shall  have  arrived  at  the 
age  of  twenty-one  years,  in  further  trust  to  convey  the  same 
to  the  said  children  share  and  share  alike  in  fee  simple.  But 
if  it  shall  be  thought  advisable  by  my  executors  and  execu- 


82  LIFE   OP   THOMAS   PAINE. 

trix,  or  the  survivor  or  survivors  of  them,  at  any  time  before 
the  youngest  of  the  said  children  shall  come  of  age,  to  sell 
and  dispose  of  the  said  south  side  of  the  said  farm,  in  that  case 
I  hereby  authorize  and  empower  my  said  executors  to  sell  and 
dispose  of  the  same,  and  I  direct  that  the  money  arising  from 
such  sale  be  put  into7  stock,  either  in  the  United  States  bank 
stock  or  New  York  Phoenix  Insurance  company  stock,  the  in- 
terest or  dividends  thereof  to  be  applied  as  is  already  direct- 
ed, for  the  education  and  maintenance  of  the  said  children  ; 
and  the  principal  to  be  transferred  to  the  said  children  or  the 
survivor  of  them  on  his  or  their  coming  of  age.  I  know  not  if 
the  society  of  people  called  quakers  admit  a  person  to  be  bu- 
ried in  their  burying-ground,  who  does  not  belong  to  their  so- 
ciety, but  if  they  do,  or  will  admit  me,  I  would  prefer  being 
buried  there,  my  father  belonged  to  that  profession,  and  I  was 
partly  brought  up  in  it.  But  if  it  is  not  consistent  with  their 
rules  to  do  this,  I  desire  to  be  buried  on  my  farm  at  New  Ro- 
chelle.  The  place  where  I  am  to  be  buried  to  be  a  square 
of  twelve  feet,  to  be  enclosed  with  rows  of  trees,  and  a  stone 
or  post  and  railed  fence,  with  a  head-stone  with  my  name 
and  age  engraved  upon  it,  author  of  '  Common  Sense.'  I 
nominate,  constitute,  and  appoint  Walter  Morton,  of  the 
New  York  Phoenix  Insurance  company,  and  Thomas  Addis 
Emmet,  counsellor-at-law,  late  of  Ireland,  and  Margaret  B. 
Bonneville  my  executors  and  executrix  to  this  my  last  will 
and  testament,  requesting  them  the  said  Walter  Morton  and 
Thomas  Addis  Emmet,  that  they  will  give  what  assistance 
they  conveniently  can  to  Mrs.  Bonneville,  and  see  that  the 
children  be  well  brought  up.  Thus  placing  confidence  in 
their  friendship,  I  herewith  take  my  final  leave  of  them  and 
of  the  world.  I  have  lived  an  honest  and  useful  life  to  man- 
kind ;  my  time  has  been  spent  in  doing  good  ;  and  I  die  in 
perfect  composure  and  resignation  to  the  will  of  my  Creator 
God.  Dated  this  eighteenth  day  of  January,  in  the  year  one 
thousand  eight  hundred  and  nine,  and  I  have  also  signed  my 
name  to  the  other  sheet  of  this  will  in  testimony  of  its  being 
a  part  thereof.  THOMAS  PAINE.  (L.  s.) 

Signed,  sealed,  and  published  and  declared  by  the  testa- 
tor, in  our  presence,  who,  at  his  request,  and  in  the  presence 
of  each  other,  have  set  our  names  as  witnesses  thereto,  the 
words  '  published  and  declared '  first  interlined. 

WILLIAM  KEESE. 
JAMES  ANGEVIEN, 
CORNELIUS  RYDEB." 


CONCLUDING   APPLICATION.  88 

I  have  now,  so  far  as  I  can  discover,  recorded  all  the 
facts  in  relation  to  Thomas  Paine,  with  which  the  public 
have  any  concern.  I  have  even  repeated  some  things  (under 
protest,  be  it  remembered)  with  which  the  public  have  no 
business  whatever. 

But  the  most  important  part  of  the  task  which,  on  refer- 
ence to  my  title-page,  it  will  be  perceived  that  I  undertook 
remains  to  be  completed. 

Every  one  will  unquestionably  draw  their  own  conclu- 
sions from  facts  or  what  they  consider  such.  But  I  assure 
all  whom  it  may  concern,  that  I  should  not  consider  myself 
justified  in  troubling  them  with  my  views  on  matters  of  the 
vast  importance  of  religion  or  highest  law,  and  govern- 
ment or  social  science,  had  I  not  devoted  to  these  subjects 
long  years  of  assiduous  preparation  ;  had  I  not,  rightly  or 
wrongly,  systemised  facts;  even  now,  I  do  so  with  a  full 
consciousness  of  my  need  of  vastly  more  light. 

Facts,  separately  considered,  are  but  the  unconnected 
links  of  a  chain  ;  truth  is  the  chain  itself.  Facts,  in  them- 
selves, are  worth  nothing  ;  it  is  only  the  truths  that  are  de- 
ducible  from  them  through  their  systemization  that  is  of  use. 
Brick,  and  mortar,  and  beams,  are  facts ;  entirely  useless, 
however,  until  systemized  into  an  edifice.  Every  man's  life 
is  a  fact,  but  the  lives  of  such  men  as  Rousseau,  Paine, 
Comte,  Luther,  and  Fourier,  are  sublime  truths  which  are 
to  help  to  give  to  the  lives  of  the  individuals  of  our  race,  all 
that  can  be  conceived  of  even  "  eternal"  value. 

Strictly  speaking,  all  authors  are,  like  Paine,  and  Rous- 
seau, and  Comte,  heroes.  But  those  writers  who  merely  re- 
vamp, or  polish  up  old,  worn  out  ideas,  and  then  sell  them 
back  again  to  those  from  whom  they  stole,  or  borrowed,  or 
begged  them,  are  no  more  authors  than  they  are  manufactu- 
rers who  steal,  borrow,  beg,  or  buy  for  next  to  nothing,  old 
hats,  iron  them  over,  and  sell  them  back  for  new  to  their 
former  owners,  who  in  their  delight  to  find  how  truly  they 
fit  their  heads,  do  not  suspect  the  cheat.  It's  a  somewhat 
dfficult  thing  to  make  new  hats  fit  heads.  It's  a  Herculean  task 
to  make  new  ideas  fit  them.  It's  next  to  impossible  to  make 
new  habits  fit  mankind. 

The  American  Revolution,  of  which  Paine  was  the  "  au- 
thor hero,"  and  the  French  Revolution,  of  which  Rousseau 
was  the  great  mover,  were,  as  I  trust  we  have  already  seen, 
but  closely  connected  incidents  in  the  grand  Revolution  which 
began  with  man's  instinctive  antagonism  to  all  which  stair1.- 


34  CONCLUDING  APPLICATION. 

in  the  way  of  the  perfect  liberty  which  nature  has,  by  one  and 
the  same  act,  given  him  both  the  desire  for,  and  the  assu- 
rance of. 

All  which  exists  or  has  taken  place,  is  connected  with  all 
which  ever  has  existed,  or  will  exist  or  take  place  ;  and  un- 
less the  historian  shows  that  connection,  so  far  as  it  has  a 
perceptibly  practical  bearing,  history  becomes  but  a  mere  col- 
lections of  curious,  and  otherwise  barren  details. 

I  have  before  directed  the  attention  of  the  reader  to  the 
fact,  that  whoever  penned  the  Declaration  of  our  National 
Independence,  must  have  well  studied  Rousseau's  "  Contrai 
Social." 

The  Rev.  Dr.  Smith,  in  his  "  Divine  Drama  of  History 
and  Civilization,"  speaks  thus  of  the  relation  of  Rousseau  to 
his  times : — 

"  Rousseau  was  the  avenging  spirit  of  the  Evangelical 
Protestants  whom  monarchical  France  had  massacred  or 
banished.  He  had  the  blood  and  the  soul  of  the  Presbyterian 
in  him :  but  he  was  drunk  with  vengeance,  and  he  had,  accord- 
ing to  his  own  confession,  imbibed  with  his  mother's  milk  the 
hatred  of  kings,  and  nourished  that  hate  and  kept  it  warm. 
He  declared  that  though  man  was  born  free  he  was  every- 
where in  chains.  Being  gifted  with  great  eloquence,  he  de- 
lighted his  readers.  He  realized  the  government  of  the  peo- 
ple and  became  the  soul  of  the  Revolution." 

"  Twelve  hundred  human  individuals,"  says  Thomas  Car- 
lyle,  "  with  the  Gospel  of  Jean  Jacques  Rousseau  in  their 
pocket,  congregating  in  the  name  of  twenty-five  millions, 
with  full  assurance  of  faith,  to  "  make  the  Constitution  :" 
such  sight,  the  acme  and  main  product  of  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury, our  World  can  witness  only  once.  For  time  is  rich  in 
wonders,  in  monstrosities  most  rich  ;  and  is  observed  never  to 
repeat  himself  or  any  of  his  Gospels  : — surely  least  of  all  this 
Gospel  according  to  Jean  Jacques.  Once  it  was  right  and 
indispensable,  since  such  had  become  the  belief  of  man  ;  but 
once  also  is  enough." 

"  They  have  made  the  Constitution,  these  Twelve  Hun- 
dred-Jean-Jacques Evangelists." 

"  A  new  Fifth  Evangelist,  Jean-Jacques,  calling  on  men 
to  amend  each  the  whole  world's  wicked  existence,  and  be 
saved  by  making  the  Constitution." 

Thomas  Carlyle  in  innumerable  other  cases  speaks  most  lov- 
ingly of  "  Poor  Jean  Jacques."  In  an  elaborate  critical  esti- 
mate of  Rousseau  and  the  men  of  the  18th  century,  he  says  : 


CONCLUDING  APPLICATION.  86 

"  Hovering  in  the  distance  with  use — struck  minatory  air- 
stern-beckoning,  comes  Rousseau.  Poor  Jean- Jacques  !  Al- 
ternately deified  and  cast  to  the  dogs  :  a  deep-minded,  high- 
minded,  even  noble,  yet  woefully  misarranged  mortal,  with 
all  the  misformations  of  nature  intensified  to  the  verge  of 
madness  by  unfavorable  Fortune.  A  lonely  man  ;  his  life  a 
long  soliloquy !  The  wandering  Tiresias  of  his  time  ; — in 
whom,  however,  did  lie  prophetic  meaning,  such  as  none  of 
the  others  offer.  His  true  character,  with  its  lofty  aspirings 
and  poor  performings  ;  and  how  the  spirit  of  the  man  worked 
so  wildly  like  celestial  fire  in  a  thick,  dark  element  of  chaos, 
and  shot  forth  etherial  radiance,  all  piercing  lightning,  yet 
could  not  illuminate,  was  quenched  and  did  not  conquer  ;  this 
with  what  lies  in  it,  may  now  be  pretty  accurately  apprecia- 
ted." etc. 

The  world-famous  "  Confessions  "  of  Rousseau,  have  also 
powerfully  stimulated  revolt  against  the  most  despotic  of  ty- 
rannies that  ever  enchained  the  human  race.  No  romance 
was  ever  half  so  interesting.  With  resistless  power  their  au- 
thor compels  us  to  himself.  Every  page  chains  the  rea- 
der with  electric  fascination.  With  absorbing  interest  we 
follow  him  in  every  step  of  his  strange  sad  life.  Not  a  scene 
in  the  Confessions  but  what  has  formed  the  subject  for  a  mas- 
ter piece  by  some  great  artist.  Rousseau  was  one  of  those 
men  whose  fame  the  world  has  taken  into  its  own  hands. 
One  of  those  big-hearted,  truth-loving,  high-aspiring  yet  sad- 
fated,  stumbling  men,  whose  sufferings  have  been  made  up  for  by 
an  eternal  meed  of  tenderness  and  love.  He  has  been  taken 
into  the  heart  of  mankind. 

Perhaps  nothing  could  more  markedly  manifest  the  place 
Jean  Jacques  holds  in  the  heart  of  the  world  than  the  love 
and  reverence  which  have  been  lavished  on  him  by  all  the 
high-souled  poets  and  writers  in  every  land  since  his  day. 
Goethe,  Schiller,  Jean  Paul,  Shelley,  Brougham,  Byron,  Car- 
lyle,  Tennyson,  etc.  etc.  All  that  is  fresh  and  lofty  and  spi- 
ritual in  the  new  French  school  of  Poetry  and  Literature,  is 
distinctly  traceable  to  Rousseau.  Bernadin  de  Saint  Pierre, 
Mad.  de  Stael,  Chateaubriand,  Lamartine,  etc.,  etc.,  were  suc- 
cessively formed  under  his  influence  and  adoringly  worship- 
ped him  as  their  master.  Thomas  Carlyle  in  a  conversation 
with  Emerson,  (see  English  Traits,  p.  22,)  while  speaking  of 
the  men  who  had  influenced  the  formation  of  his  character, 


86  CONCLUDING   APPLICATION. 

declared  that  Rousseau's  Confessions  had  *  discwered  to  him 
that  he  (Carlyle)  was  not  a  dunce.. 

R.  W.  Emerson,  too,  speaks  of  "  The  Confessions  "  as  a 
book  so  important  in  literature,  that  it  was  weU  worth  while  fe 
translate  *  *  its  courage  and  precision  of  thought  win  keep  it 
good." 

And  the  high-souled  SchiUer  hymns  Rousseau  thus  : 

"  Hail  grave  of  Rousseau  !  here  thy  troubles  cease  ! 
Thy  life  one  search  for  freedom  and  for  peace  : 
Thee  peace  and  freedom  life  did  ne'er  allow  : 
Thy  search  is  ended,  and  thou  find'st  them  now  ! 
When  will  the  old  wounds  scar  !     In  the  dark  age 
Perish'd  the  wise.     Light  comes — how  fared  the  sage  ? 
The  same  in  darkness  or  in  light  his  fate, 
Time  brings  no  mercy  to  the  bigot's  hate  1 
Socrates  charmed  Philosophy  to  dwell 
On  earth  ;  by  false  philosophers  he  fell : 
In  Rousseau  Christians  marked  their  victim — when 
Rousseau  endeavored  to  make  Christians  men  I'1 

Reader,  please  to  skip  the  next  six  paragraphs,  unless 
you  can  pardon  a  digression,  (and  I  must  confess  to  have 
given  you  some  exercise  in  that  respect  already)  and  unless 
you  furthermore  love  liberty,  justice,  and  equal  rights,  not  as 
things  to  be  merely  talked  about,  sung  about,  and  "  fought, 
bled  and  died  "  about,  but  as  practical  realities. 

In  a  state  of  bliss  in  perfect  contrast  with  what  generally 
passes  for  married  life,  Rousseau  spent  several  years  with 
Madam  De  Warens  ;  a  lady  of  noble  birth,  who  was  in  com- 
fortable circumstances,  enjoying  a  pension  from  Victor  Ama- 
deus,  king  of  Sardinia.  She  was  the  wife  of  a  man  with  whom 
she  could  not  live  happily,  and  from  whom  she  therefore  sepa- 
rated. Rousseau,  in  his  "  Confessions'"  thus  describes  her : 
"  All  who  loved  her,  loved  each  other.  Jealousy  and  rivalry 
themselves  yielded  to  the  dominant  sentiment  she  inspired  ; 
and  I  never  saw  any  of  those  who  surrounded  her,  entertain 
the  slightest  ill  will  towards  each  other."  "  I  hazard  the  as- 
sertion, that  if  Socrates  could  esteem  Aspasia,  he  would  have 
respected  Madam  de  Warens."  "  Let  my  reader,"  continues 
the  enamoured  philosopher,  "  pause  a  moment  at  this  eulogy ; 
and  if  he  has  in  his  mind's  eye  any  other  woman  of  whom  he 


CONCLUDING   APPLICATION.  37 

can  say  this  mudh,  let  him,  as  ho  values  his  life's  repose, 
cleave  to  her,  were  she,  for  the  rest,  the  lowest  of  drabs. 

After  eight  years  of  bliss  with  Madam  de  Warens,  that 
lady's  taste,  though  not  her  affections,  changed.  Rousseau, 
also  wishing  to  visit  Paris,  they  parted  in  perfect  friendship. 
At  Paris,  Rousseau  resumed  the  free-love  connection  with 
The're'se  Le  Vasseur,  a  young  girl  of  small  accomplishments, 
but  of  a  most  amiable  disposition.  Some  of  the  highest  no- 
bles in  France  (including  the  king  and  queen)  did  not  disdain 
to  treat  her  with  marked  respect ;  and  after  Rousseau's 
death,  the  government  of  France  pensioned  Therese,  instead 
of  letting  her  die  of  hunger,  as  the  government  of  England, 
to  its  eternal  disgrace,  suffered  Lady  Hamilton,  the  mistress 
of  Lord  Nelson,  to  do,  although  to  that  accomplished  Lady 
and  to  her  influence  and  shrewd  management  at  the  court  of 
Naples,  England  owes  the  victory  of  Trafalgar.  One  morn- 
ing, whilst  the  king  and  his  ministers  lay  snoring,  she  man- 
aged to  obtain  from  her  intimate  friend  the  queen,  a  permit 
for  her  gallant  free-lover,  Nelson,  to  water  his  fleet  at  Nap- 
les ;  but  for  which,  he  could  not  have  pursued  and  conquered 
the  French  at  Trafalgar.  His  last  request  of  the  country  for 
whose  cause  he  was  dying,  was, — "  Take  care  of  my  dear 
Lady  Hamilton." 

Yet  England  was  too  "  virtuous  "  to  prevent  Lady  Hamil- 
ton from  depending  on  the  charity  of  a  poor  French  washer- 
woman ;  and  from  having,  at  last,  to  starve  to  death,  in  a 
garret,  in  the  capital  of  the  nation  whose  navy  had  been  al- 
most destroyed  through  her  management  and  her  lover's  bra- 
very. "  Virtue  "  and  "  piety  "  readily  accept  the  services  of 
those  they  impudently  style  "  vicious "  and  "  profane,"  but 
generally  consider  it  very  scandalous  to  reward  them. 

Some  of  the  most  "  virtuous  "  citizens  in  every  country  in 
Christendom  do  not  hesitate  to  eat  the  bread  and  wear  the 
clothes  purchased  with  the  rent  of  those  curses  inseparable 
from  present  social  institutions, — prostitution  dens ;  and 
churches  and  missionaries,  draw  large  revenues  from  these 
"  necessary  evils  "  as  they  are  cantingly  called.  Necessary 
evils  ?  If  there  is  a  "  sin  "  which  &jmt  "  God  "  could  punish, 
it  is  that  of  admitting  that  there  exists  ''  necessary  evils ;" 
for  this  "  sin  "  is  a  most  efficient  prolonger  of  the  damnation 
of  the  human  race. 

But  England  did  build  monuments  to  Nelson,  and  lie  has 
had  all  the  honor  of  the  victory  of  Trafalgar.  Why  did  not 
Lady  Hamilton  come  in  for  a  share  of  that  honor?  In  addi- 


88  CONCLUDING  APPLICATION. 

tion  to  what  we  have  seen  she  did  to  procure  that  victory,. 

can  any  gallant  man  doubt,  that  her  charms  were  the  main 

stimulus  of  Nelson's  courage  ?  What  dangers  would  not  a 
man  that  was  a  man  brave,  in  order  to  swell  with  delight, 
admiration,  and  just  approval,  the  heart  of  her  whom  he 

adored,  and  who  freely  loved  him  ? 

.  Reader,  did  you  ever  ask  yourself  why  it  is  that  gallant 
men  (and  almost  all  notable  men  are  gallant)  are  applauded 
in  high  society,  and  are  comparatively  little  blamed  or  frowned 
upon  among  the  million?  Surely,  gallantry  in  woman  is 
really  no  more  "  vicious  "  than  it  is  in  man  ;  it  is  simply  because, 
owing  to  ignorance  with  respect  to  the  regulation  of  love  af- 
fairs, it  is  more  inconvenient,  that  it  is  more  discountenanced. 
It  is  because  women  have  to  be,  under  present  institutions, 
considered  as  chattels ;  as  articles  of  luxury;  which  no  man 
wants  to  be  at  the  expense  of,  except  for  his  own  pleasure, 
of  course.  But  for  ignorance  of  how  tofuEy  gratify  every  natu- 
ral desire,  there  would  be  no  such  words  as  either  virtue  or 
vice  in  the  dictionary  ;  and  however  amiable  it  is  for  people 
to  forbear  to  gratify  themselves  in  any  respect,  at  the  expense 
of  others,  still,  we  should  constantly  bear  in  mind,  that  all  the 
honor  that  has  ever  been  bestowed  on  "  virtue  "  and  self-de- 
nial, is  primarily  due  to  ignorance  and  poverty  ;  to  ignorance 
of  how  to  create  the  means  whereby  to  dispense  with  "  virtue." 
self-denial,  ay,  and  even  that  most  virtuous  of  all  the  virtues, — 
charity  ;  to  ignorance  of  how  to  develop,  modify,  and  com- 
bine the  substantial,  till  desire  is  but  the  measure  of  fulfill- 
ment— till  to  will  is  but  the  precursor  of  to  nave. 

Human  progress  is  generally  divisible  into  three  ages  : — 
the  age  of  mystery,  the  age  of  reason,  and  the  age  of  practi- 
cal science  and  art.  '  These  answer  to  the  theological,  the  cri- 
tical, and  the  positive  stages  of  the  Grand  Revolution  just 
alluded  to  ;  of  which  revolution,  the  "  author  hero  "  was  Au« 

GUSTE  COMTE. 

Rousseau  and  Paine  had  their  forerunner  in  Martin  Lu- 
ther ;  Comte's  John  Baptist  was  Charles  Fourier. 

To  Martin  Luther  and  Charles  Fourier,  mankind  are  al- 
most as  much  indebted,  as  to  those  for  whom  these  prepared 
the  way. 

Fourier  was  far  more  in  advance  of  his  time  than  wap 
Luther  ;  still,  Luther's  step  was  much  the  most  perilous  to 
himself.  Whoever  can  look  on  the  picture  [I  saw  it  in  the 
Dusseldorff  Gallery]  of  Luther  at  the  Diet  of  Worms,  with 
dry  eyes,  without  feeling  an  admiration  near  akin  to  adora- 


CONCLUDING   APPLICATION.  89 

tion  for  The  Man  who  would  go  where  the  cause  of  -liberty 
called  him,  "  though  there  should  be  there  as  many  devils  as 
tiles  on  the  roofs,"  must  be  made  of  sterner  stuff  than  I  am. 

Look  on  that  incarnation  of  bravery.  See  how  undaunted 
that  single  representative  of  the  cause  of  the  human  race 
stands,  amidst  the  terrible  array  of  princes  and  bishops. 
There  were  six  hundred  of  them  ;  headed  by  the  Emperor  him- 
self. 

As  fearlessly  as  Paine  first  openly  pronounced  those  trea- 
sonable words —  "  American  Independence,"  Luther  has 
dared  to  burn  the  Pope's  bull,  even  when  there  was  not  a 
crowned  head  in  all  Christendom,  but  trembled  at  that  awful 
document.  Surely  the  heart  that  warms  for  Paine  must  glow 
for  Luther.  Materialist  though  I  am,  I  do  reverence  that 
brave  monk.  Had  the  Elector  of  Saxony  been  the  most  ab- 
solute monarch  that  ever  reigned  ;  and  had  the  Landgrave 
of  Hesse,  taken  as  many  wives*  and  concubines  as  the  wisest 
man,  in  Jehovah's  estimation,  that  ever  was  or  ever  will  be, 
is  said  to  have  had,  these  princes  would  nevertheless  deserve 
the  eternal  gratitude  of  mankind,  for  the  protection  they  af- 
forded to  the  great  apostle  of  reform,  but  for  the  division,  in 
the  ranks  of  despotism,  which  he  created,  a  Rousseau  and  a 
Paine  could  not  so  soon  have  preached  liberty,  nor  could  a 
Fourier  and  a  Comte  as  yet  have  indicated  how  to  put  it  into 
practice. 

To  the  zeal  and  liberality  of  Mr.  Albert  Brisbane, 
and  to  the  scholarship  of  Mr.  Henry  Clapp,  Jr.,  are  English 
readers  indebted  for  an  introduction  to  Fourier's  great  work, 
"  The  Social  Destiny  of  Man^\  And  the  same  class  of  readers 
are  similarly  indebted  to  Mr.  Lombe  and  Miss  Harriet  Mar- 
tineas:}:  (the  latter  aided  by  professor  Nichol)  for  being  en- 

*  "  All  the  theologians  of  Wittemberg  assembled  to  draw  up  an  answer 
[to  the  Landgrave's  petition  to  be  allowed  to  have  two  wives,]  and  the  re- 
8ult  was  a  compromise.  He  was  allowed  a  double  marriage,  on  condition 
that  his  second  wife  should  not  be  publicly  recognized." 

"  If,  nevertheless,  your  highness  is  fully  resolved  to  take  a  second  wile, 
w?  are  of  opinion  that  the  marriage  should  be  secret." 

"  Given  at  Wittemberg,  after  the  festival  of  St.  Nicholas,  1539,— Mar- 
tin Luthar,  Philipp  Melancthon,  Martin  Bucer,  Antony  Corvin,  Adam,  John 
lining,  Justin  Wintfert,  Dionisius  Melanther." — Mickelets  Life  of  Lu- 
tlier. 

Published  by  Calvin  Blanchard. 

J  Between  whom  and  Mr.  Atkinson,  there  took  place  that  admirabk 
correspondence  on  the  subject  of  the  "  Laws  of  Mtui's  Nature  and  Develop 


90  CONCLUDING  APPLICATION. 

abled  to  acquaint  themselves  with  "  The  Positive  Philosophy 
of  Augusts  Comte."* 

These  great  works  are  carrying  on  a  constructive,  and 
therefore  noiseless  and  unostentatious  revolution  ;  they  do 
not  (particularly  the  latter)  appeal  to  the  common  under- 
standing, and  the  masses  will  know  but  little  about  them, 
until  they  feel  their  beneficient  effects.  But  the  keen  observer 
and  the  social  artist  perceive  that  they  have  already  given  a 
new  tone  to  all  the  higher  literature  of  Western  Europe,  and 
even,  to  some  extent,  to  that  of  the  United  States. 

'Tis  strange  that  they  who  are  capacitated  to  think  truth, 
should  so  generally  have  made  the  unfortunate  blunder  of 
not  seeing  that  by  the  masses,  truth  of  any  great  degree  of  com- 
plexity can  only  be  felt.  Their  religion  is  addressed  almost 
wholly  to  their  feeling.  Their  knock-down  argument  to  all 
opposition,  is,  "  /  feel  it  to  be  true."  A  more  unreasonable 
scheme  never  emanated  from  Bedlam,  than  that  of  plying  the 
masses  with  reason,  on  subjects  so  complicated  as  are  religion 
and  sociology.  Has  not  the  experiment  uniformly  proven 
the  truth  of  what  I  here  assert  ?  Reason  is,  of  course,  con- 
nected with  every  thing  which  a  sane  person  voluntarily  does 
or  thinks  of.  It  is  connected  with  the  construction  of  the 
steam  engine ;  and  should  be  similarly,  and  only  similarly 
connected  with  social  architecture. 

Numerous  experiments  to  which  the  name  of  Fourier  ha& 
been  attached,  have  failed.  But  there  was  not  one  of  them 
which  bore  the  most  distant  resemblance  to  the  system  of  the 
great  master,  whose  name  they  so  over-zealously  and  rashly 
appropriated. 

A  very  successful  trial  of  the  household  economies  of  Fou- 
rier has  been  going  on  in  New  York  for  the  last  three  years, 
under  the  management  of  Mr.  E.  F.  Underbill.  His  "  Cos- 
mopolitan Hotel"  comprises  four  elegant  five  story  brown 
stone  front  houses,  situated  in  the  most  fashionable  part  of 
Fourteenth-street. 

The  world  has  been  prevented  from  becoming  acquainted 
with  Fourier's  magnificent  discoveries  in  social  architecture, 
mainly  through  the  agency  of  the  blackest  and  most  impudent 
falsehood  ever  uttered.  Fourier's  system  has  been  denounced 
as  communism  ;  whereas  it  is  the  very  opposite  of  that.  Our 

ment,"  republished  in  a  neat  volume  by  Mr.  J.  P.  Mendum,  publisher  of  the 
"  Boston  Investigator." 

*  Published  by  Calvin  Blanchard. 


CONCLUDING   APPLICATION.  91 

present  social  hodge-podge  is  Skidmoreism  itself,  when  com- 
pared with  the  system  of  which  "  The  Social  Destiny  of  Man," 
notwithstanding  its  incidental  and  non-essential  errors  is  a 
bold  and  true  outline.  Next  in  importance  to  the  discoveries 
of  Comte,  are  Fourier's  with  respect  to  the  human  passions, 
and  with  respect  to  the  equitable  adjustment  of  the  claims  of 
labor,  skill,  and  capital. 

But  Fourier's  system  was,  so  to  speak,  the  edifice  in  ad- 
vance of  the  foundation  on  which  alone  it  could  stand.  Real 
liberty,  substantial  happiness,  and  practical  goodness  must 
have  a  material  basis.  That  basis  has  been  furnished  by  Au- 
guste  Comte. 

Mr.  Lewes,  in  his  Biographical  History  of  Philosophy,* 
says  :  "  Comte  is  the  Bacon  of  the  nineteenth  century.  Like 
Bacon,  he  fully  sees  the  cause  of  our  intellectual  anarchy,  and 
also  sees  the  cure.  We  have  no  hesitation  in  recording  our 
conviction  that  the  Course  de  Philosophic  Positive  is  the  great- 
est work  of  our  century,  and  will  form  one  of  the  mighty 
landmarks  in  the  history  of  opinion.  No  one  before  him 
ever  dreamed  of  treating  social  problems  otherwise  than 
upon  theological  or  metaphysical  methods.  He  first  showed 
how  possible,  —  nay,  how  imperative — it  was  that  social  ques- 
tions, should  be  treated  on  the  same  footing  with  all  other 
scientific  questions." 

And  Mill,  in  his  "  System  of  Logic,"t  speaks  thus  of  "  The 
Positive  Philosophy  :" —  "  A  work  which  only  requires  to 
be  better  known,  to  place  its  author  in  the  very  highest  class 
of  European  thinkers.  *  *  *  A  sociological  system  widely 
removed  from  the  vague  and  conjectural  character  of  all  for- 
mer attempts,  and  worthy  to  take  its  place,  at  last,  among 
established  sciences.  *  *  *  A  work  which  I  hold  to  be  far 
the  greatest  yet  produced  in  the  Philosophy  of  the  Sciences. 
*  *  *  He  [Comte]  may  truly  be  said  to  have  created  the 
philosophy  of  the  higher  mathematics.  *  *  *  Whose  view 
of  the  philosophy  of  classification  is  the  most  erudite  with 
which  I  am  acquainted.  *  *  *  His  works  are  the  only 
source  to  which  the  reader  can  resort  for  a  practical  exem- 
plification of  the  study  of  social  phenomena  on  the  true  prin- 
ciples of  the  Historical  Method.  Of  that  method  I  do  not 
hesitate  to  pronounce  them  a  model." 

*  This  work  should  be  in  the  possession  of  every  scientific  lover  of  lib- 
erty.    It  is  published  by  D.  Appleton  &  Co. 
f  Published  by  Harper  &  Brothers. 


92  CONCLUDING   APPLICATION. 

"  Clearness  and  depth,  comprehensiveness  and  precision 
have  never  probably,  been  so  remarkably  united  as  in  Au- 
guste  Comte,"  says  Professor  GiUespie,  of  Union  College,  New 
York. 

The  following  extracts  from  an  article  (understood  to  be 
by  Sir  David  Brewster)  which  appeared  in  the  Edinburgh 
fieview  will  also  give  some  further  idea  of  the  aim  and  char- 
acter of  The  Positive  Philosophy  : 

"  A  work  of  profound  science,  marked  with  great  acute- 
ness  of  reasoning,  and  conspicuous  for  the  highest  attributes 
of  intellectual  power.  It  comprehends  MATHEMATICS,  ASTRO- 
NOMY, PHYSICS,  and  CHEMISTRY,  or  the  sciences  of  Inorganic 
Bodies  ;  and  PHYSIOLOGY,  and  SOCIAL  PHYSICS,  or  the  sciences 
of  Organic  Bodies. 

"  Under  the  head  of  SOCIAL  PHYSICS  the  author  treats  of 
the  general  structure  of  human  societies,  of  the  fundamental 
natural  law  of  the  development  of  the  human  species,  and  of 
the  progress  of  civilization.  This  last  Section  is  subdivided 
into  three  heads — the  THEOLOGICAL  EPOCH,  the  METAPHYSIC- 
AL EPOCH,  and  the  POSITIVE  EPOCH — the  first  of  these  embra- 
cing FETISHISM,  POLYTHEISM,  and  MONOTHEISM." 

Referring  to  the  Astronomical  part  of  the  work,  the  Re- 
viewer says,  "  We  could  have  wished  to  place  before  our  rea- 
ders some  specimens  of  our  author's  manner  of  treating  these 
difficult  and  deeply  interesting  topics — of  his  simple,  yet 
powerful  eloquence — of  his  enthusiastic  admiration  of  intel- 
lectual superiority — of  his  accuracy  as  a  historian,  his  honesty 
as  a  judge,  and  of  his  absolute  freedom  from  all  personal  and 
national  feelings." 

But  the  mental  effort  which  produced  the  "Positive  Phi- 
losophy "  was  too  much  for  the  brain  of  any  one  man  to  make 
with  impunity,  as  the  subsequent  writings  of  the  great  posi- 
tivist  show.  With  respect  to  these,  and  particularly  to  Com- 
te's  Positive  Religion,  Mr.  Lewes  very  considerately  re- 
marks,— "  let  us  draw  a  veil  over  them  ;"  and  I,  who  have 
made  Comte  a  study,  will  add,  that  any  other  view  than  this, 
with  respect  to  the  writings  which  Comte  sent  forth  to  the 
world  after  the  Positive  Philosophy,  is  most  unjust. 

The  clergy  are  at  length  aware  that  the  slander  and 
abuse  which  they  have  bellowed  forth  from  the  pulpit  against 
Paine,  have  advertised  his  works  more  effectually  than  ten 
per  cent  of  their  own  salaries  could  have  done  through  the 
newspapers  ;  and  hence  the  profound  silence  which  they 
maintain  with  respeo1  to  the  personalty  of  Comte,  and  to  tho 


CONCLUDING  APPLICATION.  93 

name  of  "  The  Positive  Philosophy"  Priests  know  that  the 
world's  old  religion  is  dead  ;  but  they  mean  to  prolong  its 
decay  to  the  utmost,  in  order  to  feed,  like  carrion  crows,  on 
its  rotten  carcass  ;  they  therefore  take  every  precaution 
against  having  it  stirred  up. 

Observe  in  what  general  terms  the  "  black  coats,"  as  Hum- 
boldt  styles  the  parsons,  denounce  the  materialism  with  which 
all  the  high  talent  of  the  age  in  which  we  live  is  imbued. 
They  do  not  wish  to  let  their  dupes  know  that  such  men  as 
Humboldt  and  Comte  did  not  believe  in  the  existence  of  the 
extra-almighty  pedant  whom  they  seat  on  the  throne  of  the 
universe. 

We  have  already  seen  that  the  author  of  "  Cosmos  "*  not 
only  held  superstition  and  its  ministers  in  as  utter  contempt 
as  did  he  who  wrote  "  The  Age  of  Reason,"  but  that  he  was 
furthermore  a  thorough  materialist ;  and  the  author  of  The 
Positive  Philosophy  has  mathematically  annihilated  a  God 
who  can  have  no  practical  existence  to  man,  together  with 
the  supposed  foundation  of  a  faith,  the  further  teaching  of 
which,  can  but  hold  human  perfection  in  abeyance.  Yet  the 
aristocracy  of  Europe  were  proud  of  the  companionship  of 
Humboldt,  and  emperors  and  kings  presented  him  with  testi- 
monials of  their  high  regard. 

As  to  Auguste  Comte,  it  is  rumored  that  the  Emperor 
Napoleon  III.  held  frequent  conferences  with  him  ;  and  the 
encouragement  which  that  manarch  is  giving  to  men  of  sci- 
ence is  matter  of  public  notoriety. 

But  how  does  "  The  Model  Republic"  compare  with  mo- 
narchical Europe  in  these  vitally  important  matters  ?  Is  not 
the  noise  which,  in  the  United  States,  is  made  about  freedom, 
as  hollow  as  is  the  din  with  which  our  loud-belled  churches 
call  their  congregations  to  the  worship  of  him  who  they  ne- 
vertheless say  enjoined  secret  devotion  ? 

In  a  country  where  no  throned  sovereign  bears  sway, 
where  no  crowned  pope  sends  forth  his  bull  forbidding  the 
offices  of  human  kindness  to  be  extended  to  those  who  have 
incurred  his  displeasure,  what  dread  tyrant  willed  that 
Thomas  Paine  should  be  shunned  by  many  of  his  illustrious 
compeers  ; — that  his  bones  should  be  refused  a  resting  place 
beside  those  of  even  the  least  persecuting  and  vindictive  of  all 
the  Christian  sects  ;  that  his  name  should  be  almost  left  put 
of  the  history  of  the  glorious  deeds  which  his  inspiration 

*  Rppublished  by  Messrs.  Harper  &  Brothers, 


94  CONCLUDING  APPLICATION. 

caused  to  be  performed,  and  even  to  this  day,  be  held,  in 
utter  abhorrence,  by  nearly  all  those  for  whose  welfare  hia 
life  and  spendid  talents  were  so  cheerfully  devoted  ?  Who, 
is  that  tyrant  ? 

"  Priestcraft ! "  readily  answer  they  who  zealously  ad- 
vocate popular  free  discusson,  and  an  appeal  to  popular 
opinion,  as  a  means  of  finding  out  how  to  deal  with  those 
most  important  and  complicated  of  all  affairs, — religion 
and  government.  "  Priestcraft !"  they  exclaim ;  ,as  they 
lavish  their  carefully  unsystemized  sociological  facts,  their  cri- 
tical exposition's,  and  their  logical  deductions,  upon  the  hor- 
rified, astounded,  and  enraged,  but  not  at  all  edified  multitude. 

Well,  my  friends,  between  you  and  me,  I  must  acknow- 
ledge that  you  have  slapped  that  tyrant's  prime  minister, full 
in  the  face.  Try  it  again.  But  first  gather  up  your  pearls, 
lest  the  many  before  whom  you  have  indiscriminately  cast 
them,  and  who  want  something  of  which  they  can  make  a  far 
more  practical  and  satisfactory  use,  turn  upon  and  "  rend  you." 
"Ignorance!  of  course  we  know  that  priestcraft  thrives 
on  ignorance.  Ignorance  is  that  tyrant ;"  methinks  I  hear 
you  further  answer. 

Yes,  my  friends,  ignorance  is  that  tyrant.  But  still,  the 
most  important,  and  by  far  most  difficult  question  remains 
unanswered.  He  is  not  ignorance  of  the  fact  that  the  Bible  is 
of  human  origin.  The  Bible  is  but  one  of  the  weather-cocks 
which  tell  which  way  the  wind  of  popular  folly  blows.  The 
Koran  is  another,  and  so  is  the  Book  of  Mormon.  And 
they  are  all  rather  useful  than  otherwise,  as  they  furnish  sug- 
gestions as  to  the  course  to  be  pursued  by  scientific  and  ar- 
tistic reformers.  He  is  not  ignorance  with  respect  to  read- 
ing, writing,  geography,  grammar,  arithmetic,  Greek,  Latin  ; 
in  short,  he  is  not  ignorance  of  anything  which  has  hitherto 
been  taught  or  thought  of  in  any  school  or  college. 

I'll  tell  you  what  lie  is  ignorance  of,  presently  ;  and,  at  the 
same  time,  I  will  demonstrate  how  to  liberate  man  from  his 
despotism,  and  rescue  the  memory  of  Thomas  Paine  from  the 
reproach  which  has  been  so  unjustly,  so  blindly,  or  else  so  un- 
intentionally heaped  upon  it. 

Are  such  rights  as  English  Constitutionalism  can  give  us 
worth  contending  for  ?  Independence  is  the  only  measure 
that  can  be  of  any  avail  ;  substantially  said  Thomas  Paine  to 
those  more  cautious  rebels  who,  at  the  commencement  of  "  the 
times  that  t'?ied  men's  souls,"  were  '  glooming  pver  the  miser- 
able effects  which  half  measure*  had  produced. 


CONCLUDING   APPLICATION.  9b 

Are  such  shams  of  rights  as  eaucus-and-ballot-boxism  can 
give  us,  worth  spending  any  more  time,  and  money,  and  agi- 
tation upon  ?  I  ask,  and  appeal  to  what  has  been  most  lying- 
ly  named  free  government  in  Greece,  Rome,  England,  Ve- 
nice, France,  the  United  States,  and  wherever  else  it  haa 
been  attempted  to  make  permanent  the  crisis  stage  of  pro- 
gress which  marks  the  departure  from  monarchy.  No,  my 
friends,  Art-Liberty  alone,  can  be  of  any  avail. 

Art-Liberty  may  now  sound  as  strange  as  did  American 
Independence  when  first  pronounced  by  Thomas  Paine ;  ay, 
and  as  treasonable,  too.  Still,  I  repeat,  nothing  short  of 
Art-Liberty  can  prevent  the  freedom-experiment  which  Paine 
so  powerfully  incited,  from  failing  in  the  United  States,  as 
badly  as  it  has  in  e^ery  other  country  where  it  has  been 
tried. 

How  far  short  of  such  failure  is  that  experiment  now  ? 
when  statesmen,  and  philosophers,  ay,  and  philanthropists, 
are  seriously  discussing  the  question,  whether  "  free  laborers  " 
or  "  slaves  "  have  the  most  uncomfortable  time  of  it  ? 

Look  at  the  opaque  webb  of  entanglement  which  our  *'  re- 
presentatives "  have  wove,  or  "  enacted "  for  us,  and  called 
"  law."  Look  at  the  wretched  and  expensive  farces  which 
the  administerers  of  these  "  laws  "  play,  under  the  name  of 
"  trials."  Are  caucusing,  balloting,  "  constitutions,"  "  laws," 
and.  jury-trial-jiistice  the  sum  and  substance  of  the  liberty  for 
which  Paine  stimulated  that  glorious  band  which  Washing- 
ton led,  to  sacrifice  their  lives  ?  Is  this  the  end  of  the  revo- 
lution which  "  Common  Sense  "  instigated  ? 

Was  the  earth  fertilized  and  the  ocean  reddened  with  hu- 
man blood,  and  were  both  earth  and  ocean  strewn  with  the 
ashes  and  the  wrecks  of  human  skill  and  industry,  in  order 
to  achieve  demagogism  ?  In  fine,  are  nature's  resources  fully 
exhausted,  only  to  produce  such  a  miserable  abortion  that 
her  highest  being,  man,  abjures  her  for  the  "  supernatural  ?" 
Surely  this  cannot  be  so. 

Reader,  did  you  ever  notice  the  fact  that  the  United 
States  Government  and  that  of  Russia  are,  and  have  always 
been  on  remarkably  loving  terms  with  each  other  ?  Well, 
this  is  but  as  natural  as  it  is  for  "  birds  of  a  feather  to  flock 
together."  The  political  systems  of  both  Russia  and  Ame- 
rica, are,  about  equally,  as  pure  absolutisms  as  governments 
can  be.  In  Russia,  the  head  of  the  majority-despotism 
•which  tyranizea,  is  designated  by  birth.  The  Russian  Gov- 
ernment is  a  simple  despotism,  modifiable  by  assassination.  In 


96  CONCLUDING   APPLICATION. 

the  United  States,  the  band  of  conspirators  for  wholesale 
violence  and  wrong, — the  head,  or  directory  of  the  majority 
despotism  which  tyrannizes,  is  designated  by  caucus  fraud, 
and  ballot-boxjugglery  ;  aided  by  perjury,  bribery,  corruption, 
and  by  the  occasional  use  of  the  fist,  the  bludgeon,  the  dag- 
ger, and  the  pistol.  The  difference  between  Russian  and 
American  'despotism  is  so  non-essential,  that  no  two  great 
governments  in  the  world  have  shown  such  marked  good 
feeling  for  each  other,  as  have  that  of  the  Czar  and  those  fa- 
vorites with  whom  he  shares  the  spoils,  and  that  of  the  Pre- 
sident, by  whom  and  his  sycophants,  the  United  States  is 
freshly  subjugated  and  plundered  every  four  years. 

But  what  do  you  mean  by  Art-Liberty  ?  Methinks  I  hear 
those  ask  who  have  not  already  hid  their  stupidity  from  them- 
selves, under  that  common  cover  of  dullness, — "  Utopia." 

By  Art-Liberty,  my  friends,  I  mean  the  practiced  applica- 
tion of  all  science  and  art  systemized,  as  fast  as  unfolded.  The 
only  law  which  can  govern  a  free  state,  must  be  discovered  ; 
it  must  be  drawn  from  the  whole  of  science  and  art ;  not "  en- 
acted ;"  human  law  can  no  more  be  "  enacted "  than  can 
physical  law. 

Art-Liberty  will  be  the  crowning  art  of  arts  in  develop- 
ing nature's  resources,  of  discovering  and  modifying  her  laws 
and  of  combining  her  powers  till  "  creation  "  shall  be  complete , 
till  supply  shall  be  adequate  to  demand  ;  till  nature's  grand 
end,  which  the  aim  of  her  highest  consciousness  instinctively  • 
indicates,  is  attained  ;  till  nature's  highest  organism,  man, 
attains  to  happiness  not  only  perfect,  but  lasting  enough 
to  fully  satisfy  his  five-sense  nature  without  recourse  to  "  be- 
yond the  skies  ;"  till  all  physical  obstacles  to  man's  liberty  to 
be  happy  are  removed,  even  to  the  unfriendliness  of  climate  1 
Not,  by  such  fanciful  means  as  that  great  seer,  Fourier,  sup- 
posed, but  wholly  through  the  working,  with  nature,  of  sci- 
ence and  art,  which  have  conquered  steam  and  electricity, 
and  made  so  many  other  things  which  were  inimical  to  man's 
happiness,  the  very  means  of  promoting  it ;  and  which  will 
make  the  good  of  everything,  through  use,  in  exact  propor- 
tion to  its  present  evil,  through  abuse  or  neglect. 

Man's  leaders,  must  find  out  how  to  satisfy  man's  highest 
aspirations,  instead  of  catering  for  his  prejudices  ;  instead  of 
confirming  him,  by  flattery  and  cajolery,  in  his  false,  superna- 
tnralistic  notions  -T  instead  of  studying  the  trickery  of  repre- 
senting and  plundering  him.  And  they  will  rapidly  find  this 
out,  as  soon  as  a  knowledge  (already  attaiDed)  of  the  unity 


CONCLUDING   APPLICATION.  97 

of  science,  spreads  among  them,  and  along  with  it,  its  correl- 
late, — that  all  mankind  are  one  organism,  no  individual  of 
which  can  be  indifferent  to  each  and  att  of  the  others.  Enlight- 
ened, far-seeing,  aft-benefiting  selfishness  will  then  take  the 
place  of  short-sighted,  suicidal,  penny  wise  pound  foolish 
cunning  ;  and  that  barricade  of  hypocrisy, — duty,  that  most 
fallible  of  all  guides, — conscience,  and  "  virtue  "  and  "  vice," 
those  most  unscientific  and  mischievous  expressions  that  have 
ever  crept  into  the  vocabulary  of  human  folly,  will  be  obso- 
lete. 

Let  us  draw  a  picture  of  the  condition  of  things  which 
the  current  schemes  of  politics,  religion,  moralism,  "  virtue," 
and  "  law  "  must  very  shortly  produce,  if  they  had  unopposed 
sway — if  the  requirements  of  both  our  civil  and  religioua 
guides  were  fully  complied  with  : — 

If  all  contracts  in  accordance  with  present  "law"  were 
fulfilled  to  the  letter,  and  if  all  the  "  duties  "  enjoined  by  pre- 
sent moralism  were  unflinchingly  performed,  and  if  all  which 
"  virtue  "  styles  "  vice "  was  entirely  abstained  from,  and  if 
what  is  now  "  free  trade"  according  to  "  law,"  had  a  "  fair 
field,"  how  long  would  it  take  a  millionth  of  the  earth's  inha- 
bitants to  accumulate  att  its  wealth  ?  In  my  opinion,  it 
would  not  take  ten  generations  to  produce  that  reign  of 
"  law,"  "  principle,"  morality,"  "  virtue,"  and  "  free,  trade," 
or  "  mind-your-own  business," — and-every-one-for-himself-ism/ 
on  the  earth. 

But  there  must  be  no  stealing,  swindling,  or  robbery,  a& 
legally  defined,  on  any  account ;  and  there  must  be  no  sexual 
intercourse  out  of  .  the  bonds  of  monogamy,  even  for 
bread  ;  and  above  all,  there  must  be  no  acts,  or  even  words  of 
treason.  The  laboring  man  and  the  laboring  woman,  must 
patiently  and  slowly  (nay,  not  very  slowly  I'm  thinking)  die 
on  such  wages  as  they  who,  in  perfect  security,  hold  all  the 
wealth,  chose  to  give  ;  and  those  out  of  work  must  brave 
martyrdom  to  "principle"  by  starving,  straightway,  unless 
they  can  obtain  a  "  permit,"  to  drag  out  a  few  months,  pos- 
sibly years,  in  sack-cJoth  and  on  water-gruel  in  an  alms- 
house.* 
In  all  soberness,  I  ask,  is  not  this  a  fair  statement  of  the 

*I  claim  to  have  here  made  a  very  liberal  concession  ;  for  I  have  strong 
doubts  as  to  whether  old  fogyism,  if  it  had  it  all  its  own  way,  and  had  not 
the  slightest  fear  of  being  disturbed,  would  furnish  even  alms-houses,  sack- 
eloth,  and  water-gruel  to  anu  of  its  victims ;  to  those  who  were  too  "  shift 
lew  '  to  take  care  of  themselves. 


98  CONCLUDING   APPLICATION. 

case  ?  and,  therefore,  is  not  an  entire  change,  religious,  social, 
and  moral,  the  only  thing  that  can  cure  present  religious, 
social,  and  moral  disease  ?  And  who  are  nearest  to  the 
"  kingdom  of  heaven?''*  who  are  least  obstructive  to  the  "  mil 
lenium  ?"  they  who  are  now  considered  moral,  virtuous,  and 
respectable,  or  they  whom  such  term  immoral,  vicious,  and  the 
vilest  of  the  vile  ? 

The  only  thing  that  ever  made  me  seriously  consider  whe- 
ther or  not  "  Jesus  "  was  a  divine  personage,  was,  the  prefer- 
ence which  he  uniformly  gave  to  "  sinners,"  "  publicans  and 
harlots,"  even,  over  the  "  Scribes,  Pharisees  and  hypocrites," 
who  performed  all  which  "  the  law  "  and  moralism  required. 
And  I  must  confess  that  I  am  still  astonished  that  any  one 
should,  almost  two  thousand  years  ago,  so  fully  have  under- 
stood what  so  very  few,  even  now,  have  any  conception  of. 
Yet  this,  the  strongest  argument  which  can  be  adduced  to 
prove  "  Christ's  "  divinity,  the  doctors  of  that  divinity  have 
never,  to  my  knowledge,  brought  up.  Need  I  add  that  the 
reason  is  very  evident?  Of  course,  were  the  doctors  aforesaid 
to  make  a  thorough  use  of  this  argument,  they  would  upset  the 
whole  present  political,  legal,  and  moral  scheme.  Well, 
would  it  not  be  best  to  overthrow  it  by  any  means  what- 
ever ?  or,  to  put  the  question  more  justly,  can  present  "  in- 
stitutions "  be  too  soon  or  too  thoroughly  superseded  by  those 
which  Art-Liberty,  but  for  them,  would  produce  ? 

Opinionism  and  moralism,  like  "  supernaturalism,  (of 
which  they  are  the  refinement)  have  ages  since,  exhausted 
•what  little  power  for  good  they  ever  had,  and  became  so  ex- 
ceedingly morbific  to  the  social  organism,  that  they  cannot 
be  too  speedily  excreted.  Reason  and  free  discussion  were 
once,  in  the  fifth  century,  I  believe,  seriously  engaged  on  the 
question  as  to  whether  angels  could  go  from  one  point  to 
another  without  passing  through  intermediate  space  ;  and  I 
myself,  in  the  nineteenth  century,  have  heard  reason  and  free 
discussion  on  the  question  as  to  whether  there  was  or  was 
not  a  personal  devil ;  nay,  that  devil's  tail  was  actually  dis- 
cussed and  reasoned  upon.  How  much  progress  have  reason 
and  free  discussion  made  since  the  fifth  century  ?  Have  they 
made  any  ?  Are  we  not  indebted  for  every  bit  of  liberty  we 
enjoy  now,  more  than  mankind  did  then,  to  science  and  art  ? 
always  excepting  what  little  good  reason  and  free  discussion 
or  subjectivism  have  done  as  very  common  and  proportion- 
ably  subordinate  auxiliaries,  during  crisis-stages  of  revoli* 
tion.  Then,  these  weapons,  when  wielded  by  such  men  a* 


APPLICATION.  99 

Thoiuas  Paine,  uwre  of  use  :  nay,  would  have  been  of  use,  had 
the  social  structure  which  they  were  the  instruments  of  tear- 
vng  down  been  replaced  by  one  realiy  wiu,  instead  of  by  one 
duilt  of  the  damaged,  ay,  even  rotten  materials  of  the  old  one. 
Paine  did  all  which  he  could  be  expected  to  do  ;  but  his  no- 
ble efforts  were  not  seconded  ;  for  they  who  wield  his  wea- 
pons now,  resemble  those  soldiers  who,  instead  of  attacking 
fresh  foes,  continue  to  thrust  their  swords  into  the  bodies  of 
the  slain.     Was  Thomas  Paine  here  to-day,  his  old  remedies, 
religious  and  political  popular  free  discussion  and  reasoning 
would  be  thrown  aside  ;  or  only  used  to  assist  science  and  art 
to  displace  them  in  religious  and  state  affairs.     How  other- 
wise could  he  be  Thomas  Paine  ?    He  who  was  the  very  in- 
carnation of  revolution  ?    True,  he  trusted  that  he  should 
"never  use  any  other  weapons  than  those  of  reason  ;"*  but  he 
had  before  trusted  that  British  constitutionalism  was  the  best 
possible  thing  for  the  State.     Yet  how  widely  and  nobly  did 
he  afterwards  change  his  course  in  that  respect ;  and  would 
he  not  now  see  full  as  much  cause  as  he  did  then-,  for  taking 
another  tack  ?  Can  any  sensible  person,  who  would  honor  his 
memory,  say  that  he  would  not  ?  say  that  he  would  be  satis- 
fied with  the  despotism  which  caucus-and-ballot-boxism  has 
palmed  off  on  us,  or  with  any  of  the  means  hitherto  used  to 
get  rid  of  it  ? 

Man's  right  to  be  self-governed  is,  equally  with  his  desire 
to  be  so,  self-evident.  But  what  is  most  insultingly  termed 
"  elective  franchise,"  is  the  farthest  thing  possible  from  self- 
government.  It  is,  except  as  a  transient  or  crisis-stage  expe- 
dient, of  all  fallacies  the  most  monstrous.  As  a  permanency, 
it  has  no  type,  and  consequently  no  warrant  throughout  na- 
ture. In  every  instance  where  majorityism  has  become 
chronic,  it  has  proved  as  bewildering  and  destructive  to  the 

*  "The  most  formidable  weapon  against  errors  of  every  kind  is  Rea- 
son. I  have  never  used  any  other,  and  I  trust  I  never  shall  ;"  says  Paine 
in  his  dedication  of  "  The  Age  of  Reason"  to  his  "  fellow-citizens  of  the  United 
States  of  America."  But  he  had  dreadful  experience  of  the  rebound  against 
himself,  which  the  blows  that  he  dealt  with  that  weapon  caused.  And  su- 
perstition is  fully  as  rampant  with  the  multitude  now,  as  it  was  before  the 
•Age  of  Reason"  was  written  ;  and  it  is  as  rife  now,  as  it  then  was,  even 
with  the  higher  classes  ;  with  the  exception  that  is  clearly  traceable  to 
science  and  art.  Every  man  of  intelligence  at  all  above  the  vulgar  knows, 
that  not  only  Ethan  Allen,  Jeflerson,  and  Franklin  "were  infidels"  as  the 
phrase  is,  but  that  Lafayette,  and,  in  fact,  nearly  all  the  other  revolutionary 
worthies,  no  more  believed  in  the  "divinity"  of  "The  Bible,"  than  Paine  did. 


100  CONCLUDING  APPLICATION. 

social  organism,  as  the  worst  insanity  proves  to  the  individu- 
al. There  is  no  record  of  society's  being  afflicted  with  the 
caucus-and-ballot-box  mania  for  any  considerable  length  of 
time,  without  having  to  be  confined  in  the  straight  jacket  of 
military  despotism  ;  or  prescribed  a  double  dose  of  essentially 
the  same  kind  of  tyranny  from  which  it  had  been  so  madly 
supposed  that  an  escape  had  been  made.  What,  then,  I  ask, 
in  behalf  of  Thomas  Paine,  whose  distinguishing  characteris- 
tic, was  to  "  go  ahead,"  is  the  use  of  fooling  any  longer  with 
the  speculative,  abstract,  tantalizing  shadows  of  human  rights, 
which  our  corrupt,  spoil-seeking  demagogues  impudently 
palm  off  on  us  for  liberty  ?  And  why  persist  longer  in  re- 
peating the  miserable  religious  and  moral  failures  into  which 
our  religious  and  moral  quacks  plunge  us  ? 

To  what  purpose  have  both  religion  and  politics  been  so 
freely  discussed,  for  nearly  a  century  past,  in  the  United 
States,  by  all  who  had  more  tongue  than  brain,  and  more  van- 
ity than  depth  of  research  ?  This  is  not  saying  that  some  wise 
and  very  worthy  people  have  not  also  been  led  into  the  fal- 
lacy that  abstract  subjectivism  was  sufficient  to  remedy  des- 
potism. I  was  once  in  that  unfortunate  predicament  myself  ,* 
and  the  axiom  of  Thomas  Jefferson  (I  believe  it  was  Jeffer- 
son's, at  any  rate  it  is  the  axiom  of  his  loudest  followers)  was, 
that  error  may  be  safely  trusted  where  reason  is  left  free  to 
combat  it.  But  I  ask  in  all  soberness,  has  error  been  safely 
trusted  in  the  United  States,  though  reason  is  there  as  free 
to  combat  it  as  the  majority  will  let  it  be  ?  And  with  what 
good  effect,  so  far  as  social  architecture  is  concerned,  have 
carefully  culled,  and  almost  as  carefully  isolated  facts  been 
laid  before  the  multitude,  whose  views  are  necessarily  con- 
fined to  the  specialities  which  constitute  their  calling,  since 
the  acute  stage  of  revolution  in  this  country  ? 

I  tell  you  that  facts,  to  be  worth  any  thing,  must  be  sys- 
temized  ;  and  that,  too,  immeasurably  more  in  social  or  state 
affairs  than  in  any  others  ;  and  that  this  requires  the  wisest 
heads  that  can  grow  on  human  shoulders,  aided  by  all  science 
and  art,  and  by  the  most  laborious  and  uninterrupted  prepa- 
ration. Social  Science  is  the  art  of  arts  ;  not  the  art  of  po- 
litical trickery. 

In  spite  of  all  the  freedom  of  the  tongue  and  of  the  press 
which  the  majority  will  allow  to  be  exercised,  or  can  allow 
to  be  exercised  till  social  science  and  art  take  charge  of  edu- 
cation, is  not  our  political  system  corrupt  to  the  very  core  ? 
Are  not  they  who  have  charge  of  the  public  treasury  a  very 


CONCLUDING   APPLICATION.  101 

gang  of  thieves  ?  And  are  not  they  whom  "  elective  fran- 
chise "  places  at  the  head  of  affairs,  plunging  the  nation  in- 
to bankruptcy  every  few  years,  and  at  shorter  and  shorter 
intervals,  by  their  reckless  wastefulness,  in  letting  the  life- 
blood  of  industry,  as  now  carried  on — money — pour  abroad 
like  water,  for  the  sake  of  catching  their  dippers  full  of  it  ? 

And  as  to  religion  : — has  not  the  empire  state,  New  York, 
in  1 860,  enacted  Sunday-laws  which  would  have  done  credit 
to  the  Blue  Code  of  Connecticut  in  1650  ?  Are  not  church- 
building,  and  church-going,  and  revivalism,  ay,  and  Mormon- 
ism,  rife  among  that  very  multitude — that  highest  court  from 
whose  dread  decrees  there  is  no  present  appeal,  to  whom  free 
discussion  and  facts  have  been  presented  to  the  extent  they  can 
be  by  present  methods  ? 

The  popular  free-discussion  of  affairs  of  the  last  degree 
of  complication — religious  and  state  affairs — except  during 
the  crisis  period  of  revolution,  only  renders  that  worst  of  des- 
potisms, anarchy,  chronic :  it  seats  in  the  social  organism, 
that  political  gangrene — demagogism — which  has  always 
Hitherto,  sooner  or  later,  required  the  cauterization  of  mili- 
tary despotism,  (a  remedy  att  but  as  bad  as  the  disease)  in  or- 
der to  be  got  rid  of — in  order  to  save  even  civilization.  Des- 
pofism  is  the  most  inveterate  of  all  the  diseases  of  the  social 
organism  which  ignorance  has  inflicted  ;  nay,  it  is  a  complica- 
tion of  aU  its  diseases.  What,  my  fellow-man,  would  any  of  • 
you  think  of  the  physician  who  should  consult  with  an  indi- 
vidual organism  with  a  view  to  taking  that  organism's  opin- 
ion as  to  what  course  he  (the  physician)  had  best  pursue  in 
order  to  cure  him,  (the  organism)  of  scrofula,  complicated 
with  every  other  bodily  disease  to  which  flesh  is  heir  ? 
Would  not  the  patient,  if  he  had  one  spark  of  common  sense 
left,  order  such  a  doctor  out  of  doors  ?  with  "  Sir,  I  expected 
aid  from  your  science  and  your  healing  art ;  and  did  not  em- 
ploy you  to  mock  and  insult  me  in  my  wretchedness." 

Would  any  one  who  possessed  a  spark  of  reason,  even, 
venture  at  sea  in  a  vessel,  with  respect  to  the  management  of 
which,  the  vote  of  all  who  happened  to  go  on  board  was 
going  to  be  taken?  And  do  the  managers  of  the  ship  of 
.state  require  less  preparation  than  do  common  sailors  ?  Do 
they  not  require  so  much  more  useful  knowledge  than  they 
have  ever  been  qualified  with,  that  tney  have  always  wrecked 
or  capsized  the  ship  of  state,  except  where  it  is  only  a  ques- 
tion of  time  when  they  will  do  so  ?  Evidently,  church  and 
vtate  management  require  art  and  skill  infinitely  superior  to 


102  CONCLUDING   APPLICATION. 

what  "  supernaturalism  "  and  its  legitimate  child,  mot  arehism. 
or  its  bastard  issue,  caucus-and-ballot-boxism,  are  capable  of. 
From  the  dissecting  room ;  the  chemical  laboratory  ;  the  as- 
tronomical observatory  ;  the  physician's  and  physiologists 
study  ;  in  fine,  from  all  the  schools  of  science  and  art,  should 
human  law  be  declared,  instead  of  being  "  enacted  "  in  legis- 
lative halls,  by  those  who,  in  every  respect  besides  political 
trickery,  fraud,  and  "  smartness,"  are  perfect  ignoramuses. 

Nature  throughout,  must  be  so  modified  (not  changed)  ;  so 
liberated  from  the  thraldom  of  antagonism  or  counteraction  ;  in 
short,  so  improved  by  art,  that  the  conditions  which  now  ne- 
cessitate despotism  and  evil  will  be  superseded  by  those  which 
will  make  liberty,  and  all  that  is  desirable,  as  spontaneous  as 
is  the  order  of  the  spheres. 

Man  naturally  desires  to  be  good.  There  is  not,  never  was, 
and  never  can  be,  a  sane  human  being  who  would  not  like  to 
have  things  so  arranged,  that  every  human  desire  could  be  ful- 
ly gratified,  instead  of,  as  now,  almost  wholly  denied  gratifi- 
cation ;  man's  "  holy  "  or  ''  heavenly  "  desires, — the  very 
quintessence  of  sensualness,  are  a  constant,  and  will  be  an 
everlasting  testimony  to  the  truth  of  this. 

Priescraft  cannot  be  put  down,  till  man  obtains  his  "  be- 
ing's" end  and  aim,"  or  is  satisfied  that  it  is  attainable,  in  this 
material,  this  perceptible,  this  sense-world.  To  desire  must 
be  to  possess,  with  the  exception  (if  it  can  be  called  an  excep- 
tion) of  the  intervention  of  just  exertion  enough  to  give  to  pos- 
session its  due  value.  Mankind  will,  with  few  exceptions, 
scorn  reason,  so  long  as  it  arrays  itself  against  human  in- 
stinct ;  against  what  man/eefe  to  be  true.  And  until  science 
and  art  give  man  (or  assure  him  that  they  can  give  him)  the 
perfect  and  sufficiently  lasting  happiness  which  he  instinctive- 
ly knows  that  the  power  which  created  him  owes  him  and 
stands  pledged  to  give  him  or  turn  out  to  be  an  almighty  fai- 
lure, he  will  pursue  that  happiness  even,  beyond  the  grave  ; 
with  priestcraft  for  his  guide,  of  course. 

Can  nature  or  all  existence,  fail  ?  and  allow  the  drafts  which, 
on  the  indisputable  testimony  of  the  human  passions,  she  haa 
authorized  her  highest  beings  to  draw  on  her,  to  be  protest- 
ed ?  Surely,  "  supernaturalism  "  itself  is  less  absurd  than  this. 

Friends  of  human  rights !  Believers  in  progress !  Is  any 
thing  more  certain,  than  that  combined  science  and  its  cor- 
responding art,  or  full  and  complete  development,  must  prove 
adequate  to  all  for  which  "  miracle  "  can  be  intelligibly  ift 
voked  ? 


CONCLUDING    APPLICATION  103 

Ignorance  with  respect  to  this,  then;  ignorance  of  how  to  de- 
velop nature's  resources,  and  modify  and  harmoniously  combine 
her  powers,  so  as  to  liberate  her  tendency  to  perfection  from 
all  obstructions — so  as  that  her  means  will  correspondent  to 
her  ends, — constitutes  the  tyi-ant  in  search  of  whom  we  start- 
ed. There  he  stands !  But  he  is  not  invulnerable,  nor  is  his 
fearfully,  ay,  att  but  "supernaturally"  strong  fortress  impreg- 
nable. Let  us  "up  and  at  him,"' then,  as  determinedly  as  our 
sires  of  glorious  memory  charged  his  minions  at  Bunker 
Hill.  Parleying,  as  we  have  learned  by  long,  sad  experience, 
is  sheer  nonsense  ;  quarter  being  out  of  the  question.  This 
arch  enemy  of  mankind  must  be  annihilated  before  liberty 
can  be  an  actuality.  And  the  religious  faith  of  the  hu- 
man race  must  be  transferred  from  the  mysterious  and  impos- 
sible, and  from  their  correlates,  the  subjective  and  speculative, 
to  the  intelligible  and  practical.  And  these  must  be  shown 
capable  of  fulfilling  man's  highest  aspirations,  before  he 
can  truly  understand  the  mission,  and  fully  appreciate  the 
•^orth  of  THOMAS  PAINE. 

I  trust  I  have  shown  that,  to  conquer  the  tyrant  which 
ignorance  of  how  to  be  free  constitutes,  was  the  common  aim, 
and  the  real,  however  glimmeringly  perceived  object,  of  the 
exertions  of  Rousseau,  Paine,  Cornte,  and  all  the  other  au- 
thor-heroes and  heroines,  who  have  ever  written.  In  con- 
clusion allow  me  to  propose  a  crisis-question  for  the  pratical 
consultation  upon,  of  my  friends,  whose  religion  (If  I  may  be 
allowed  to  accuse  them  of  having  any]  reason  and  free  dis- 
cussion compose : 

How  can  man  be  extricated  from  having  to  grovel  round 
and  round  and  round  in  the  hopeless  orbit  which  has  mystery 
for  its  center,  monarchy  for  his  aphelion,  demagogism  for  its 
perihelion,  and  unvarnished  wretchedness  or  gilded  misery 
for  its  whole  course,  except  by  scientifically,  artistically,  and 
unitedly  creating  the  requisite  conditions  for  Actual  liberty? 

All  have  their  hobby.  Mine,  it  will  be  pretty  clearly  per- 
ceived is, — that  nature,  through  development,  will  prove  aUr 
sufficient. 

Come,  all  ye  who  delight  in  the  amble  of  that  well-tried 
hack, — popular  religious,  political,  and  sociological  discussion, 
and  who  do  not  like  the  complexion  of  present  religious,  po- 
litical, and  social  institutions,  and  who  are  not  enamoured 
of  the  millennium  which  I  have  shown  would  constitute  their 
ultimatum  : — If  you  object  to  Art-Liberty,  please  to  let  the 
world  know  definitely,  what  you  do  propone. 


APPENDIX. 


As  ono  of  '.bo  most  heroic  acts  of  Thomas  Paine's  life,, 
and  one  which  alno  showed  the  profoundness  of  his  political 
wisdom,  was  his  speech  in  opposition  to  the  execution  of 
Louis  XVI.,  I  wish  to  draw  particular  attention  to  it ;  and 
therefore  give  it  a  place  in  an  Appendix ;  for  I  have  observed 
that  even  the  most  cursory  readers  generally  look  at  the  end 
of  a  work. 

This  speech,  Mr.  Paine  well  understood,  would  expose  him 
to  the  fiercest  wrath  of  the  Jacobins,  who,  sustained  by  the 
triumphant  rabble,  had  resolved,  in  the  king's  case,  to  dis- 
pense  with  even  the  forms  of  "justice,"  to  the  extent  of  set- 
ting aside  the  rule  which  required  the  sanction  of  a  two- 
thirds  majority  for  the  infliction  of  the  death  penalty.  "  We 
vote,"  protested  Lanjuinai's.  when  the  balloting  was  ordered 
to  commence,  "  under  the  daggers  and  the  cannon  of  the  fac- 
tions." 

In  order  to  more  fully  understand  in  what  fearful  peril 
Mr.  Paine  voluntarily  placed  himself  by  delivering  this 
speech,  it  will  be  necessary  to  know  that  "  the  factions  "  to 
which  deputy  Lanjuinais  referred,  were  composed  of  the 
cruel  monsters  (and  their  abettors)  who,  a  short  time  before^ 
had  "  laboured"  as  their  horrible,  but  " disinterested "  leader,. 
Maillard,  termed  it,  during  thirty-six  hours,  at  massacreeing 
the  unarmed  prisoners,  who  had  been  committed  on  mere  sus- 
picion of  not  being  friendly  to  the  powers  that  then  held 
sway ;  and  for  which  "  labour,"  its  zealous  and  industrious 
performers,  all  covered  with  blood  and  brains,  demanded  in, 
stant  payment  of  the  committee  of  the  municipality,  threaten- 
ing them  with  instant  death  if  thay  did  not  comply. 


APPENDIX.  105 

"  Do  you  think  I  have  earned  only  twenty-four  franca  ?'' 
•said  one  of  these  'principled  assassins,  blandishing  a  massive 
weapon,  "  why,  I  have  slain  forty  with  my  own  hands." 


SPEECH    OF     THOMAS    PAINE,    AS     DEPUTY    IN     THB 
NATIONAL  CONVENTION  OF  FRANCE,  IN  OPPO- 
SITION TO  THE  EXECUTION  OF  THE  KING. 

CITIZEN  PRESIDENT  : 

My  hatred  and  abhorrence  of  absolute  monarchy  are  suffi- 
ciently known  ;  they  originated  in  principles  of  reason  and 
conviction,  nor,  except  with  life,  can  they  ever  be  extirpated  ; 
but  my  compassion  for  the  unfortunate,  whether  friend  or 
enemy,  is  equally  lively  and  sincere. 

I  voted  that  Louis  should  be  tried,  because  it  was  neces- 
sary to  afford  proofs  to  the  world  of  the  perfidy,  corruption, 
and  abomination  of  the  French  government. 

The  infinity  of  evidence  that  has  been  produced  exposes 
them  in  the  most  glaring  and  hideous  colours. 

Nevertheless  I  am  inclined  to  believe  that  if  Louis  Capet 
had  been  born  in  an  obscure  condition,  had  he  lived  within 
the  circle  of  an  amiable  and  respectable  neighbourhood,  at 
liberty  to  practice  the  duties  of  domestic  life,  had  he  been 
thus  situated  I  cannot  believe  that  he  would  have  shewn  him- 
self destitute  of  social  virtues  ;  we  are,  in  a  moment  of  fer- 
mentation like  this,  naturally  little  indulgent  to  his  vices,  or 
rather  to  those  of  his  government ;  we  regard  them  with  ad- 
ditional horror  and  indignation  ;  not  that  they  are  more  hei- 
nous than  those  of  his  predecessors,  but  because  our  eyes  are 
now  open,  and  the  veil  of  delusion  at  length  withdrawn  ;  yet 
the  lamentably  degraded  state  to  which  he  is  actually  re- 
duced is  surely  far  less  imputable  to  him  than  to  the  constitu- 
ent assembly  which,  of  its  own  authority,  without  consent  or 
advice  of  the  people,  restored  him  to  the  throne. 

I  was  present  at  the  time  of  the  flight  or  abdication  cf 
Louis  XVI.,  and  when  he  was  taken  and  brought  back.  The 
proposal  of  restoring  to  him  the  supreme  power  struck  me 
with  amazement ;  and  although  at  that  time  I  was  not  a  citi- 
zen, yet  as  a  citizen  of  the  world,  I  employed  all  the  effortg 
that  depended  on  me  to  prevent  it. 

A  small  society,  composed  only  of  five  persons,  two  01 
whom  are  now  members  of  the  convention,  took  at  that  time 


106  APPENDIX. 

the  name  of  the  Republican  Club  (Socie*te*  Republicaine). 
This  society  opposed  the  restoration  of  Louis,  not  so  much  on 
account  of  his  personal  offences,  as  in  order  to  overthrow 
monarchy,  and  to  erect  on  its  ruins  the  republican  system 
and  an  equal  representation. 

With  this  design  I  traced  eut  in  the  English  language 
certain  propositions  which  were  translated,  with  some  trifling 
alteration,  and  signed  by  Achilles  Duchelclet,  lieutenant- 
general  in  the  army  of  the  French  republic,  and  at  that  time 
one  of  the  five  members  which  composed  our  little  party  ; 
the  law  requiring  the  signature  of  a  citizen  at  the  bottom  of 
each  printed  paper. 

The  paper  was  indignantly  torn  by  Malouet,  and  brought 
forth  in  this  very  room  as  an  article  of  accusation  against  the 
person  who  had  signed  it,  the  author,  and  their  adherents  j 
but  such  is  the  revolution  of  events  that  this  paper  is  now 
revived,  and  brought  forth  for  a  very  opposite  purpose. 

To  remind  the  nation  of  the  error  of  that  unfortunate 
day,  that  fatal  error  of  not  having  then  banished  Louis  XVI 
from  its  bosom,  the  paper  in  question  was  conceived  in  the 
following  terms  ;  and  I  bring  it  forward  this  day  to  plead  in 
favor  of  his  exile  preferably  to  his  death. 

"  Brethren,  and  fellow  Citizens  :  The  serene  tranquillity, 
the  mutual  confidence  which  prevailed  amongst  us  during 
the  time  of  the  late  king's  escape,  the  indifference  with  which 
we  beheld  him  return,  are  unequivocal  proofs  that  the  ab- 
sence of  the  king  is  more  desirable  than  his  presence,  and 
that  he  is  not  only  a  political  superfluity  but  a  grievous  bur- 
then pressing  hard  on  the  whole  nation. 

"  Let  us  not  be  imposed  on  by  sophisms  :  all  that  con- 
cerns this  man  is  reduced  to  four  points.  He  has  abdicated 
the  throne  in  having  fled  from  his  post.  Abdication  and  de- 
sertion are  not  characterized  by  length  of  absence,  but  by  the 
single  act  of  flight.  In  the  present  instance  the  act  is  every 
thing,  and  the  time  nothing. 

"  The  nation  can  never  give  back  its  confidence  to  a  man 
who,  false  to  his  trust,  perjured  to  his  oath,  conspires  a  clan- 
destine flight,  obtains  a  fraudulent  passport,  conceals  a  king 
of  France  under  the  disguise  of  a  valet,  directs  his  course  to- 
wards a  frontier  covered  with  traitors  and  deserters,  and  evi- 
dently meditates  a  return  into  our  country  with  a  force  capa- 
ble of  imposing  his  own  despotic  laws.  Ought  his  flight  to 
be  considered  as  his  own  act,  or  the  act  of  those  who  fled 
with  him?  Was  it  a  spontaneous  resolution  of  his  ow*1,  or 


APPENDFX.  107 

was  it  inspired  into  him  by  others  ?  The  alternative  is  im- 
material :  whether  fool  or  hypocrite,  idiot  or  traitor,  he  has 
proved  himself  equally  unworthy  of  the  vast  and  important 
functions  that  had  been  delegated  to  him. 

"In  every  sense  that  the  question  can  be  considered,  the 
reciprocal  obligations  which  subsisted  between  us  are  dis- 
solved. He  holds  no  longer  authority ;  we  owe  him  no  longer 
obedience  ;  we  see  in  him  no  more  than  an  indifferent  per- 
son ;  we  can  regard  him  only  as  Louis  Capet. 

"  The  history  of  France  presents  little  else  than  a  long 
scries  of  public  calamity  which  takes  its  source  from  the 
vices  oC  her  kings  :  we  have  been  the  wretched  victims  that 
have  never  ceased  to  suffer  either  for  them  or  by  them.  The 
catalogue  of  their  oppressions  was  complete,  but  to  complete 
the  sum  of  their  crimes,  treason  was  yet  wanting  ;  now  the 
only  vacancy  is  filled  up,  the  dreadful  list  is  full  ;  the  system 
is  exhausted  ;  there  are  no  remaining  errors  for  them  to  com- 
mit, their  reign  is  concequently  at  an  end. 

"  As  to  the  personal  safety  of  Mr.  Louis  Capet,  it  is  so 
much  the  more  confirmed,  as  France  will  not  stop  to  degrade 
herself  by  a  spirit  of  revenge  against  a  wretch  who  has  dis- 
honored himself.  In  defending  a  just  and  glorious  cause  it 
is  not  possible  to  degrade  it ;  and  the  universal  tranquillity 
which  prevails  is  an  undeniable  proof  that  a  free  people  know 
how  to  respect  themselves." 

Having  thus  explained  the  principles  and  exertions  of 
the  republicans  at  that  fatal  period  when  Louis  was  reinsta- 
ted in  full  possession  of  the  executive  power  which  by  his 
flight  had  been  suspended,  I  return  to  the  subject,  and  to  the 
deplorable  condition  in  which  the  man  is  now  actually  in- 
volved. "What  was  neglected  at  the  time  of  which  I  have 
been  speaking  has  been  since  brought  about  by  the  force  of 
necessity. 

The  wilful  treacherous  defects  in  the  former  constitution 
had  been  brought  to  light,  the  continual  alarm  of  treason 
and  conspiracy  roused  the  nation  and  produced  eventfully  a 
second  revolution.  The  people  have  beat  down  royalty,  never, 
never  to  rise  again  ;  they  have  brought  Louis  Capet  to  the 
bar,  and  demonstrated  in  the  face  of  the  whole  world,  the 
intrigues,  the  cabals,  the  falsehood,  corruption,  and  rooted 
depravity  of  his  government :  there  remains  then  only  one 
question  to  be  considered,  what  is  to  be  done  with  this  man  ? 
For  myself,  I  freely  confess  that  when  I  reflect  on  the  un- 
accountable folly  that  restored  the  executive  power  to  hia 


108  APPENDIX. 

hands,  all  covered  as  he  was  with  perjuries  and  treason,  I  JJD 
far  more  ready  to  condemn  the  constituent  assembly  than  the 
unfortunate  prisoner  Louis  Capet. 

But,  abstracted  from  every  other  consideration,  there  is 
one  circumstance  in  his  life  which  ought  to  cover  or  at  least 
to  palliate  a  great  number  of  his  transgressions,  and  this 
very  circumstance  affords  the  French  nation  a  blessed  occa- 
sion of  extricating  itself  from  the  yoke  of  its  kings  without 
defiling  itself  in  the  impurities  of  their  blood. 

It  is  to  France  alone,  I  know,  that  the  United  States  oi 
America  owe  that  support  which  enabled  them  to  shake  off 
an  unjust  and  tyrannical  yoke.  The  ardour  and  zeal  which 
she  displayed  to  provide  both  men  and  money  were  the  na- 
tural consequences  of  a  thirst  for  liberty.  But  as  the  nation 
at  that  time,  restrained  by  the  shackles  of  her  own  govern- 
ment, could  only  act  by  means  of  a  monarchical  organ,  this 
organ,  whatever  in  other  respects  the  object  might  be,  cer- 
tainly performed  a  good,  a  great  action. 

Let  then  these  United  States  be  the  safeguard  end  asylum 
of  Louis  Capet.  There,  hereafter,  far  removed  from  the  mi- 
series and  crimes  of  royalty,  he  may  learn,  from  the  contant 
aspect  of  public  prosperity,  that  the  true  system  of  govern- 
ment consists  in  fair,  equal,  and  honorable  representation 
In  relating  this  circumstance,  and  in  submitting  this  propo- 
sition, I  consider  myself  as  a  citizen  of  both  countries. 

I  submit  it  as  a  citizen  of  America  who  feels  the  debt  of 
gratitude  which  he  owes  to  every  Frenchman.  I  submit  it 
also  as  a  man  who  cannot  forget  that  kings  are  subject  to 
human  frailties.  I  support  my  proposition  as  a  citizen  of  the 
French  republic,  because  it  appears  to  me  the  best,  the  most 
politic  measure  that  can  be  adopted. 

As  far  as  my  experience  in  public  life  extends,  I  hare 
ever  observed  that  the  great  mass  of  the  people  are  invari- 
ably just,  both  in  their  intentions  and  in  their  objects  ;  but 
the  true  method  of  accomplishing  that  effect,  does  not  always 
show  itself  in  the  first  instance.  For  example,  the  English 
nation  had  groaned  under  the  despotism  of  the  Stuarts. 
Hence  Charles  the  1st  lost  his  life  ;  yet  Charles  the  lid  was 
restored  to  all  the  full  plenitude  of  power  which  his  father 
had  lost.  Forty  years  had  not  expired  when  the  same  family 
strove  to  re-establish  their  ancient  oppression ;  so  the  nation 
then  banished  from  its  territories  the  whole  race.  The  re- 
medy was  effectual :  the  Stuart  family  sunk  into  obscurity, 
confounded  itself  with  the  multitude,  and  is  at  length  extinct 


APPENDIX.  109 

The  French  nation  has  carried  her  measures  of  govern- 
dent  to  a  greater  length.  France  is  not  satisfied  with  ex- 
posing the  guilt  of  the  monarch,  she  has  penetrated  into  the 
vices  and  horrors  of  the  monarchy.  She  has  shown  them 
clear  as  day-light,  and  for  ever  crushed  that  system  ;  and  h«, 
vhoever  he  may  be,  that  should  ever  dare  to  reclaim  those 
rights,  would  be  regarded  not  as  a  pretender,  but  punished 
as  a  traitor. 

Two  brothers  of  Louis  Capet  hav«e  banished  themselves 
from  the  country,  but  they  are  obliged  to  comply  with  the 
spirit  and  etiquette  of  the  courts  where  they  reside. 

They  can  advance  no  pretensions  on  their  own  account, 
so  long  as  Louis  shall  live. 

The  history  of  monarchy  in  Frauce  was  a  system  preg- 
nant with  crimes  and  murders,  cancelling  all  natural  ties, 
even  those  by  which  brothers  are  united.  We  know  how 
often  they  have  assassinated  each  other  to  pave  a  way  to 
power.  As  those  hopes  which  the  emigrants  had  reposed  in 
Louis  XVI  are  fled,  the  last  that  remains  rests  upon  his 
death,  and  their  situation  inclines  them  to  desire  this  cata- 
strophe, that  they  may  once  again  rally  round  a  more  active 
chief,  .and  try  one  further  effort  under  the  fortune  of  the  ci- 
devant  Monsieur  and  d'Artois.  That  such  an  enterprise  would 
precipitate  them  into  a  new  abyss  of  calamity  and  disgrace, 
it  is  not  difficult  to  foresee  ;  yet  it  might  be  attended  with 
mutual  loss,  and  it  is  our  duty,  as  legislators,  not  to  spill  a 
drop  of  blood  when  our  purpose  may  be  effectually  accom- 
plished without  it.  It  has  been  already  proposed  to  abolish 
the  punishment  of  death,  and  it  is  with  infinite  satisfaction 
that  I  recollect  the  humane  and  excellent  oration  pronounced 
by  Robespierre  on  that  subject  in  the  constituent  assembly  * 
This  cause  must  find  its  advocates  in  every  corner  where  er- 

*  Pause,  reader,  and  weep  over  the  blindness  of  those  reformers  who 
depend  on  principle  and  good  intention.  Robespierre  preached  (oh,  tne 
"foolishness  of  (popular)  preaching"*  where  social  science  is  in  question)  against 
the  death-penalty !  And  thers  can  be  no  reasonable  doubt  but  that  he  was, 
in  principle,  opposed  to  it. 

Marat  once  confidently  exclaimed,  in  reference  to  his  known  inoorrnpt- 
ness  : — "A  patriot  so  pure  aa  myself,  might  communicate  with  the  Devil." 
The  appropriateness  of  his  association  of  personages  and  attributes,  he  pro- 
bably did  not  suspect. 

When,  oh  when,  will  principle  and  moralism,  and  that  main  supporter 
of  "vice," — "virtue,"  give  place  to  practical  goodness  ? 

"Fly  swifter  round,  ye  wheels  of  time, 
And  bring  the  welcome  day.'* 


110  APPENDIX. 

lightened  politicians  and  lovers  of  humanity  exist,  and  it 
ought  above  all  to  find  them  in  this  assembly. 

Bod  governments  have  trained  the  human  race,  and  inured 
it  to  the  sanguinary  arts  and  refinements  of  punishment ;  and 
it  is  exactly  the  same  punishment  that  has  so  long  shocked  the 
sight  and  tormented  the  patience  of  the  people  which  now  in 
their  turn  they  practise  in  revenge  on  their  oppressors. 

But  it  becomes  us  to  be  strictly  on  our  guard  against  the 
abomination  and  perversity  of  such  examples.  As  Prance 
has  been  the  first  of  European  nations  to  amend  her  govern- 
ment, let  her  also  be  the  first  to  abolish  the  punishment  of 
death,  and  to  find  out  a  milder  and  more  effectual  substitute. 

In  the  particular  case  now  under  consideration,  I  submit 
the  following  propositions. — 1st.  That  the  national  conven- 
tion shall  pronounce  the  sentence  of  banishment  on  Louia 
and  his  familly  :  2nd.  That  Louis  Capet  shall  be  detained  in 
prison  till  the  end  of  the  war,  and  then  the  sentence  of  ban- 
ishment to  be  executed. 

Brat 


COMMON   SENSE: 

ADDRESSED   TO  THE  INHABITANTS  OP  AMERICA,  ON   THE   FOLLOWING 
INTERESTING  SUBJECTS,  VIZ.: 


1  —Or  THE  ORIGIN  ASD  DESIGN  OF  GOVERNMENT  IN  GENERAL,  WITH  COKCISB 

THE    ESGLISH    CONSTITUTION. 

IL—  Or  MONARCHY  AND  HEREDITARY  SUCCESSION. 
UI.—  THOUGHTS  ON  THE  PRESENT  STATE  OF  AMERICAN  AFFAIR*. 
TV  —  OF  THE  PRESENT  ABILITY  OF  AMERICA,  WITH  SOME  MISCELLANEOUS 

TO    WH'CH    IS    ADDED    AN    APPENDIX. 


Mac  knows  no  matter  save  crtaung  heaven, 
O~  tbos*  whom  cboiea  and  common  good  ordain. 

THOMBOT. 


PUBLISHER'S   INTRODUCTION. 


"HA  y  you  seen  the  pamphlet,  l  Common  Sense?"  asked 
Major  General  Lee,  in  a  letter  to  Washington ;  "  I  never 
eaw  such  a  masterly,  irresistible  performance.  It  will,  if  I 
mistake  not,  in  concurrence  with  the  transcendent  folly  atd 
wickedness  of  the  ministry,  give  the  coup-de-grace  to  Greal 
Britain.  In  short,  I  own  myself  convinced  by  the  argu 
ments,  of  the  necessity  of  separation." 

General  Washington,  in  a  letter  to  Joseph  Reed,  Jan.  33 
1776,  says:  "A  few  more  such  naming  arguments  as  wer. 
exhibited  at  Falmouth  and  Norfolk,  added  to  the  sound  doc- 
trine and  unanswerable  reasoning  contained  in  the  pamphlet 
*  Common  Sense?  will  not  leave  numbers  at  a  loss  to  decide 
on  the  propriety  of  a  separation." 

''That  book"  (Common  Sense),  says  Dr.  Rush,  "burst 
forth  from  the  press  with  an  effect  that  has  been  rarely  pro 
duced  by  types  and  paper,  in  any  age  or  country." 


INTRODUCTION. 


PERHAPS  the  sentiments  contained  in  the  following  pages, 
*re  not  yet  sufficiently  fashionable  to  procure  them  general 
favor  ;  a  long  habit  of  not  thinking  a  thing  wrong,  gives  it 
a  superficial  appearance  of  being  right,  and  raises  at  first  a 
formidable  outcry  in  defence  of  custom.  But  the  tumult 
soon  subsides.  Time  makes  more  converts  than  reason. 

As  a  long  and  violent  abuse  of  power  is  generally  the 
means  of  calling  the  right  of  it  in  question,  (and  in  matters 
too  which  might  never  have  been  thought  of,  had  not  the 
sufferers  been  aggravated  into  the  inquiry,)  and  as  the  king 
of  England  hath  undertaken  in  his  own  right,  to  support  the 
parliament  in  what  he  calls  theirs,  and  as  the  good  people 
of  this  country  are  grievously  oppressed  by  the  combination, 
they  have  an  undoubted  privilege  to  inquire  into  the  preten- 
sions of  both,  and  equally  to  reject  the  usurpations  of 
either. 

In  the  following  sheets,  the  author  hath  studiously  avoided 
every  thing  which  is  personal  among  ourselves.  Compli- 
ments as  well  as  censure  to  individuals  make  no  part 
thereof.  The  wise  and  the  worthy  need  not  the  triumph  of 
ft  pamphlet ;  and  those  whose  sentiments  are  injudicious  or 


Tl  INTEODUOTION. 

unfriendly,  will  cease  of  themselves,  unless  too  much  pains 
is  bestowed  upon  their  conversion. 

The  cause  of  America  is,  in  a  great  measure,  the  cause  of 
all  mankind.  Many  circumstances  have,  and  will  arise, 
which  are  not  local,  but  universal,  and  through  which  the 
principles  of  all  lovers  of  mankind  are  affected,  and  in  the 
event  of  which,  their  affections  are  interested.  The  laying 
a  country  desolate  with  fire  and  sword,  declaring  war 
against  the  natural  rights  of  all  mankind,  and  extirpating 
the  defenders  thereof  from  the  face  of  the  earth,  is  the  con- 
cern of  every  man  to  whom  nature  hath  given  the  power  of 
feeling ;  of  which  class,  regardless  of  party  censure,  is 

THE  AUTHOK. 
PHILADELPHIA,  Feb.  14,  1776. 


COMMON  SENSE. 


ON  THE 

ORIGIN  AND  DESIGN  OF  GOVERNMENT  IN  GENERAL, 
WITH  CONCISE  REMARKS  ON  THE  ENGLISH  CONSTITUTION. 

SOME  writers  have  so  confounded  society  with  government, 
as  to  leave  little  or  no  distinction  between  them ;  whereas 
they  are  not  only  different,  but  have  different  origins.  Society 
is  produced  by  our  wants,  and  government  by  our  wickea- 
ness ;  the  former  promotes  our  happiness  positively  by  uniting 
our  affections,  the  latter  negatively  by  restraining  our  vices. 
The  one  encourages  intercourse,  the  other  creates  distinc- 
tions. The  first  is  a  patron,  the  last  is  a  punisher. 

Society  in  every  state  is  a  blessing,  but  government,  even 
in  its  best  state,  is  but  a  necessary  evil ;  in  its  worst  state  an 
intolerable  one ;  for  when  we  suffer,  or  are  exposed  to  the 
same  miseries  5y  a  government,  which  we  might  expect  in  a 
country  without  government,  our  calamity  is  neightened  by 
reflecting  that  we  furnish  the  means  by  which  we  suffer. 
Government,  like  dress,  is  the  badge  of  lost  innocence ;  the 
palaces  of  kings  are  built  upon  the  ruins  of  the  bowers  of 
paradise.  For  were  the  impulses  of  conscience  clear,  uni- 
form and  irresistibly  obeyed,  man  would  need  no  other  law- 
giver ;  but  that  not  being  the  case,  he  finds  it  necessary  to 
surrender  up  a  part  of  his  property  to  furnish  means  for  the 
protection  of  the  rest ;  and  this  he  is  induced  to  do  by  the 
same  prudence  which  in  every  other  case  advises  him  out  of 
two  evils  to  choose  the  least.  Wherefore,  security  being  the 
true  design  and  end  of  government,  it  unanswerably  follows 
that  whatever  form  thereof  appears  most  likely  to  ensure  it 
to  us,  with  the  least  expense  and  greatest  benefit,  is  prefera 

ble  to  all  others. 

r 


8  COMMON   SENSE. 

In  order  to  gain  a  clear  and  just  idea  of  the  design  and 
end  of  government,  let  us  suppose  a  small  number  of  persons 
settled  in  some  sequestered  part  of  the  earth,  unconnected 
with  the  rest,  they  will  then  represent  the  first  peopling 
of  any  country,  or  of  the  world.  In  this  state  of  natural 
liberty,  society  will  be  their  first  thought.  A  thousand 
motives  will  excite  them  thereto ;  the  strength  of  one  man 
is  so  unequal  to  his  wants,  and  his  mind  so  unfitted  for  per- 
petual solitude,  that  he  is  soon  obliged  to  seek  assistance 
and  relief  of  another,  who  in  his  turn  requires  the  same. 
Four  or  five  united,  would  be  able  to  raise  a  tolerable  dwel- 
ling in  the  midst  of  a  wilderness,  but  one  man  might  labor 
out  the  common  period  of  life  without  accomplishing  any 
thing ;  when  he  had  felled  his  timber  he  could  not  remove 
it,  nor  erect  it  after  it  was  removed ;  hunger  in  the  mean- 
time would  urge  him  from  his  work,  and  every  different 
want  would  call  him  a  different  way.  Disease,  nay  even 
misfortune,  would  be  death,  for  though  neither  might  be 
mortal,  yet  either  would  disable  him  from  living,  and  reduce 
him  to  a  state  in  which  he  might  rather  be  said  to  perish 
than  to  die. 

Thus  necessity,  like  a  gravitating  power,  would  soon  form 
our  newly  arrived  emigrants  into  society,  the  reciprocal 
blessings  of  which,  would  supersede,  and  render  the  obliga- 
tions of  law  and  government  unnecessary  while  they 
remained  perfectly  just  to  each  other ;  but  as  nothing  but 
heaven  is  impregnable  to  vice,  it  will  unavoidably  happen, 
that  in  proportion  as  they  surmount  the  first  difficulties  of 
emigration,  which  bound  them  together  in  a  common  cause, 
they  will  begin  to  relax  in  their  duty  and  attachment  to 
each  other ;  and  this  remissness  will  point  out  the  necessity 
of  establishing  some  form  of  government  to  supply  the 
defect  of  moral  virtue. 

Some  convenient  tree  will  afford  them  a  state-house,  under 
the  branches  of  which  the  whole  colony  may  assemble  to 
deliberate  on  public  matters.  It  is  more  than  probable  that 
their  first  laws  will  have  the  title  only  of  Regulations,  and 
be  enforced  by  no  other  penalty  than  public  disesteem.  In 
this  first  parliament  every  man  by  natural  right  will  have 
a  seat. 

But  as  the  colony  increases,  the  public  concerns  will  in- 
crease likewise,  and  the  distance  at  which  the  members  may 
be  separated,  will  render  it  too  inconvenient  for  all  of  them  to 
meet  on  every  occasion  as  at  first,  when  their  number  was 


COMMON    SENSE. 


small,  their  habitations  near,  and  the  public  concerns  few 
and  trifling.  This  will  point  out  the  convenience  of  their 
consenting  to  leave  the  legislative  part  to  be  managed  by  a 
select  number  chosen  from  the  whole  body,  who  are  sup- 
posed to  have  the  same  concerns  at  stake  which  those  have 
who  appointed  them,  and  who  will  act  in  the  same  manner 
as  the  whole  body  would  were  they  present.  If  the  colony 
continue  increasing,  it  will  become  necessary  to  augment  the 
number  of  representatives,  and  that  the  interest  of  every 
part  of  the  colony  may  be  attended  to,  it  will  be  found  best 
to  divide  the  whole  into  convenient  parts,  each  part  sending 
its  proper  number ;  and  that  the  elected  might  never  form 
to  themselves  an  interest  separate  from  the  electors,  prudence 
will  point  out  the  propriety  of  having  elections  often: 
because  as  the  elected  might  by  that  means  return  and  mix 
again  with  the  general  body  of  the  electors,  in  a  few  months, 
their  fidelity  to  the  public  will  be  secured  by  the  prudent 
reflection  of  not  making  a  rod  for  themselves.  And  as  this 
frequent  interchange  will  establish  a  common  interest  with 
every  part  of  the  community,  they  will  mutually  and  natu- 
rally support  each  other,  and  on  tnis,  (not  on  the  unmeaning 
name  of  King,)  depends  the  strength  of  government  a/nd  the 
happiness  of  the  governed. 

Here,  then,  is  the  origin  and  rise  of  government ;  namely, 
a  mode  rendered  necessary  by  the  inability  of  moral  virtue 
to  govern  the  world ;  here  too  is  the  design  and  end  of  gov- 
erment,  viz.  freedom  and  security.  And  however  our  eyes 
may  be  dazzled  with  show,  or  our  ears  deceived  by  sound ; 
however  prejudice  may  warp  our  wills,  or  interest  darken 
our  understanding,  the  simple  voice  of  nature  and  reason  will 
say,  it  is  right. 

I  draw  my  idea  of  the  form  of  government  from  a  princi- 
ple in  nature,  which  no  art  can  overturn,  viz.  that  the  more 
simple  any  thing  is,  the  less  liable  it  is  to  be  disordered : 
and  the  easier  repaired  when  disordered;  and  with  this 
maxim  in  view,  I  offer  a  few  remarks  on  the  so  much 
boasted  constitution  of  England.  That  it  was  noble  for  the 
dark  and  slavish  times  in  which  it  was  erected,  is  granted. 
When  the  world  was  overrun  with  tyranny  the  least  remove 
therefrom  was  a  glorious  rescue.  But  that  it  is  imperfect, 
subject  to  convulsions,  and  incapable  of  producing  what  it 
seems  to  promise  is  easily  demonstrated. 

Absolute  governments,  (though  the  disgrace  of  human 
nature,)  have  this  advantage  with  them  that  they  are  aim- 


10  COMMON   SENSE. 

le ;  if  the  people  suffer,  they  know  the  head  from  which 
'  eir  suffering  springs,  know  likewise  the  reiaedy,  and  are 
not  bewildered  by  a  variety  of  causes  and  cures.  But  the 
constitution  of  England  is  so  exceedingly  complex,  that  the 
nation  may  suffer  for  years  together  without  being  able  to 
discover  in  which  part  the  fault  lies,  some  will  say  in  one 
and  some  in  another,  and  every  political  physician  will  ad- 
vise a  different  medicine. 

I  know  it  is  difficult  to  get  over  local  or  long  standing 
prejudices,  yet  if  we  will  suffer  ourselves  to  examine  the 
component  parts  of  the  English  constitution,  we  shall  find 
them  to  be  the  base  remains  of  two  ancient  tyrannies,  com- 
pounded with  some  new  republican  materials. 

First. — The  remains  of  monarchical  tyranny  in  the  person 
of  the  king. 

Secondly. — The  remains  of  aristocratical  tyranny  in  the 
persons  of  thepeers. 

Thirdly. — The  new  republican  materials,  in  the  persons 
of  the  commons,  on  whose  virtue  depends  the  freedom  of 
England. 

The  two  first,  by  being  hereditary,  are  independent  of  the 
people  ;  wherefore  in  a  constitutional  sense  they  contribute 
nothing  towards  the  freedom  of  the  state. 

To  say  that  the  constitution  of  England  is  a  union  of 
three  powers,  reciprocally  checking  each  other,  is  farcical ; 
either  the  words  have  no  meaning,  or  they  are  flat  contra- 
dictions. 

To  say  that  the  commons  is  a  check  upon  the  king,  pre- 
supposes two  things. 

First. — That  the  king  is  not  to  be  trusted  without  being 
looked  after,  or  in  other  words,  that  a  thirst  for  absolute 
power,  is  the  natural  disease  of  monarchy. 

Secondly. — That  the  commons,  by  being  appointed  for  that 
purpose,  are  either  wiser  or  more  worthy  of  confidence  than 
the  crown. 

But  as  the  same  constitution  which  gives  the  commons  a 
power  to  check  the  king  by  withholding  the  supplies,  gives 
afterwards  the  king  a  power  to  check  the  commons,  by  em- 
powering him  to  reject  their  other  bills  ;  it  again  supposes 
that  the  king  is  wiser  than  those  whom  it  has  already  sup- 
posed to  be  wiser  than  him.  A  mere  absurdity  1 

There  is  something  exceedingly  ridiculous  in  the  composi- 
tion of  monarchy ;  it  first  excludes  a  man  from  the  meane 
of  information,  yet  empowers  him  to  act  in  cases  where  the 


COMMON   SENSE.  11 

highest  judgment  is  required.  The  state  of  a  king  shuta 
him  from  the  world,  yet  the  business  of  a  king  requires  hirn 
to  know  it  thoroughly ;  wherefore  the  different  parts,  by  un- 
naturally opposing  and  destroying  each  other,  prove  the 
whole  character  to  be  absurd  and  useless. 

Some  writers  have  explained  the  English  constitution 
thuo :  the  king,  say  they,  is  one,  the  people  another ;  the 
peers  are  a  house  in  behalf  of  the  king ;  the  commons  in  be- 
half of  the  people ;  but  this  hath  afl  the  distinctions  of  a 
house  divided  against  itself;  and  though  the  expressions  be 
pleasantlv  arranged,  jet  when  examined  they  appear  idle 
and  ambiguous ;  and  it  will  always  happen,  that  the  nicest 
construction  that  words  are  capable  of,  when  applied  to  the 
description  of  something  which  either  cannot  exist,  or  is  too 
Incomprehensible  to  be  within  the  compass  of  description, 
will  be  words  of  sound  only,  and  though  they  may  amuse 
the  ear,  they  cannot  inform  the  mind,  lor  this  explanation 
includes  a  previous  question,  viz.  How  came  the  king  by  a 
power  which  the  people  are  afraid  to  trust,  and  always 
obliged  to  check  f  Such  a  power  could  not  be  the  gift  of  a 
wise  people,  neither  can  any  power,  which  needs  checking,  be 
from  Goa ;  yet  the  provision  which  the  constitution  makes, 
supposes  such  a  power  to  exist. 

But  the  provision  is  unequal  to  the  task ;  the  means  either 
cannot  or  will  not  accomplish  the  end;  and  the  whole  affair 
is  a  felo  de  sej  for  as  the  greater  weight  will  always  carry 
up  trie  less,  and  as  all  the  wheels  of  a  machine  are  put  in 
motion  by  one,  it  only  remains  to  know  which  power  in 
the  constitution  has  the  most  weight,  for  that  will  govern ; 
and  though  the  others,  or  a  part  of  them  may  clog,  or,  as  the 
phrase  is,  check  the  rapidity  of  its  motion,  vet  so  long  as 
they  cannot  stop  it,  their  endeavours  will  be  ineffectual ;  the 
first  moving  power  will  at  last  have  its  way,  and  what  it 
wants  in  speed  is  supplied  by  time. 

That  the  crown  is  this  overbearing  part  in  the  English 
constitution  needs  not  be  mentioned,  and  that  it  derives  its 
whole  consequence  merely  from  being  the  giver  of  places 
and  pensions  is  self-evident,  wherefore,  though  we  have  been 
wise  enough  to  shut  and  lock  a  door  against  absolute  mon- 
archy, we  at  the  same  time  have  been  foolish  enough  to  put 
the  crown  in  possession  of  the  key. 

The  prejudice  of  Englishmen,  in  favour  of  their  own  go- 
vernment, by  kings  lords  and  commons,  arises  AS  much  or 
more  from  national  pride  than  reason.  Individuals  are  in- 


12  COMMON    SENSE. 

doubtedly  safer  in  England  than  in  some  other  countries, 
but  the  will  of  the  king  is  as  much  the  law  of  the  land  in 
Britain  as  in  France,  with  this  difference,  that  instead  of 
proceeding  directly  from  his  mouth,  it  is  handed  to  the  peo- 
ple under  the  formidable  shape  of  an  act  of  parliament. 
For  the  fate  of  Charles  the  First  hath  only  made  kings  more 
subtle — not  more  just. 

Wherefore,  laying  aside  all  national  pride  and  prejudice 
in  favour  of  modes  and  forms,  the  plain  truth  is  that  it  is 
wholly  owing  to  the  constitution  of  the  people,  and  not  tfte 
constitution  of  the  government  that  the  crown  is  not  as  op- 
pressive in  England  as  in  Turkey^. 

An  inquiry  into  the  constitutional  errors  in  the  English 
form  of  government  is  at  this  time  highly  necessary ;  for  as 
we  are  never  in  a  proper  condition  of  doing  justice  to  others, 
while  we  continue  under  the  influence  of  some  leading  par- 
tiality, so  neither  are  we  capable  of  doing  it  to  ourselves 
while  we  remain  fettered  by  any  obstinate  prejudice.  And 
as  a  man,  who  is  attached  to  a  prostitute,  is  unfitted  to 
choose  or  judge  of  a  wife,  so  any  prepossession  in  favour  of 
a  rotten  constitution  of  government  will  disable  us  from 
cerning  a  good  one. 


OF  MONARCHY  AND  HEREDITARY  SUCCESSION. 

MAITKIND  being  originally  equals  in  the  order  of  creation,, 
the  equality  could  only  be  destroyed  by  some  subsequent 
circumstance ;  the  distinctions  of  rich  and  poor,  may  in  a 
great  measure  be  accounted  for,  and  that  without  naving 
recourse  to  the  harsh  ill-sounding  names  of  avarice  and  op- 
pression. Oppression  is  often  the  consequence,  but  seldom 
or  never  the  means  of  riches ;  and  though  avarice  will  pre- 
serve a  man  from  being  necessitously  poor,  it  generally 
makes  him  too  timorous  to  be  wealthyl 

But  there  is  another  and  greater  distinction  for  which  no 
truly  natural  or  religious  reason  can  be  assigned,  and  that 
is  the  distinction  of  men  into  kings  and  subjects.  Male  and 
female  are  the  dictinctions  of  nature,  good  and  bad,  the  dis- 
tinctions of  heaven ;  but  how  a  race  of  men  came  into  the 
world  so  exalted  above  the  rest,  and  distinguished  like 


COMMON    SENSE.  13 

«ome  new  species,  is  worth  inquiring  into,  and  whether 
they  are  the  means  of  happiness  or  of  misery  to  man- 
kind. 

In  the  early  ages  of  the  world,  according  to  the  scripture 
chronology,  there  were  no  kings ;  the  consequence  of  which 
was  there  were  no  wars;  it  is  the  pride  of  kings  which 
throws  mankind  into  confusion.  Holland,  without  a  king, 
hath  enjoyed  more  peace  for  the  last  century  than  any  of 
the  monarchical  governments  of  Europe.  Antiquity  favors 
the  same  remark ;  for  the  quiet  and  rural  lives  of  the  first 
patriarchs  have  a  happy  something  in  them,  which  vanishes 
when  we  come  to  the  history  of  Jewish  royalty. 

Government  by  kings  was  first  introduced  into  the  world 
by  Heathens,  from  whom  the  children  of  Israel  copied  the 
custom.  It  was  the  most  prosperous  invention  that  was  ever 
set  on  foot  for  the  promotion  of  Idolatry.  The  heathen  paid 
divine  honours  to  their  deceased  kings,  and  the  Christian 
world  hath  improved  on  the  plan  by  doing  the  same  to 
their  living  ones.  How  impious  is  the  title  of  sacred  majesty 
applied  to  a  worm,  who  in  the  midst  of  his  splendor  is 
crumbling  into  dust  1 

As  the  exalting  one  man  so  greatly  above  the  rest,  cannot 
be  justified  on  the  equal  rights  of  nature,  so  neitheiLcan  it  be 
defended  on  the  authority  of  Scripture :  for  the  viH.  of  the 
Almighty  as  declared  by  Gideon,  and  the  prophet  Samuel, 
expressly  disapproves  of  government  by  longs.  All  anti- 
monarchical  parts  of  Scripture,  have  been  very  smoothly 
glossed  over  in  monarchical  governments,  but  they  undoubt- 
edly merit  the  attention  of  countries,  which  have  their  gov- 
ernments yet  to  form.  Render  iwito  Cesar  the  things  which 
are  Cesar's,  is  the  scripture  doctrine  of  courts,  yet  it  is  no 
support  of  monarchical  government,  for  the  Jews  at  that 
time  were  without  a  king,  and  in  a  state  of  vassalage  to  the 
Romans. 

Near  three  thousand  years  passed  away  from  the  Mosaic 
account  of  the  creation,  until  the  Jews,  under  a  national  de- 
lusion, requested  a  king.  Till  then  their  form  of  government 
(except  in  extraordinary  cases,  where  the  Almighty  inter- 
poseo)  was  a  kind  of  republic,  administered  by  a  judge  and 
the  eiders  of  the  tribes.  Kings  they  had  none,  and  it  was 
held  sinful  to  acknowledge  any  being  under  that  title  but 
the  Lord  of  Hosts.  Ana  when  a  man  seriously  reflects  on 
the  idolatrous  homage  which  is  paid  to  the  persons  of  kings, 
he  need  not  wonder  that  the  Almighty,  ever  jealous  of  hif» 


COMMON    SENSE. 


honour,  should  disapprove  a  form  of  government  which  so 
impiously  invades  the  prerogative  of  heaven. 

Monarchy  is  ranked  in  scripture  as  one  of  the  sins  of  the 
Jews,  for  which  a  curse  in  reserve  is  denounced  against  them. 
The  history  of  that  transaction  is  worth  attending  to. 

The  children  of  Israel  being  oppressed  by  the  Midianites, 
Gideon  marched  against  them  with  a  small  army,  and  vic- 
tory, through  the  divine  interposition,  decided  in  his  favor. 
The  Jews,  elate  with  success,  and  attributing  it  to  the  gen- 
eralship of  Gideon,  proposed  making  him  a  king,  saying, 
Rule  thou  over  us,  thou  and  thy  son,  and  thy  son's  son.  Here 
was  temptation  in  its  fullest  extent  ;  not  a  kingdom  only, 
but  an  hereditary  one  ;  but  Gideon  in  the  piety  of  his  soul 
replied,  /  will  not  rule  over  you,  neither  shall  my  son  rule 
over  you,  THE  LOKD  SHALL  KULE  OYEE  YOU. 
Words  need  not  be  more  explicit  ;  Gideon  doth  not  decline  the 
honour,  but  denieth  their  right  to  give  it  ;  neither  doth  he 
compliment  them  with  invented  declarations  of  his  thanks,  but 
in  the  positive  style  of  a  Prophet  charges  them  with  disaffec- 
tion to  their  proper  Sovereign,  the  King  of  heaven. 

About  one  hundred  years  after  this,  they  fell  again  into 
the  same  error.  The  hankering  which  the  Jews  had  for  the 
idolatrous  customs  of  the  Heathens,'is  something  exceedingly 
unaccountable  ;  but  so  it  was,  that  laying  hold  of  the  mis- 
conduct off  Samuel's  two  sons,  who  were  intrusted  with  some 
secular  concerns,  they  came  in  an  abrupt  and  clamorous 
manner  to  Samuel,  saying,  Behold  thou  art  old,  and  thy  sons 
walk  not  in  thy  ways,  now  make  us  a  king  to  judge  us  like 
all  the  other  nations.  And  here  we  cannot  but  observe  that 
their  motives  were  bad,  viz.  that  they  might  be  like  unto 
other  nations,  i.  e.  the  Heathen,  whereas  their  true  glory  lay 
in  being  as  much  unlike  them  as  possible.  But  the  thing 
displeased  Samuel  when  they  said,  Give  us  a  king  to  judge 
us  ;  and  Samuel  prayed  unto  the  Lord,  and  the  Lord  said 
unto  Samuel,  Hearken  unto  the  voice  of  the  people  in  all  that 
they  say  unto  thee,for  they  have  not  rejected  thee,  but  they 
have  rejected  me,  THAT  I  SHOULD  NOT  EEIGIST  OVER 
THEM.  According  to  all  the  works  which  they  have  done 
since  the  day  that  I  brought  them  up  out  of  Egypt,  even  unto 
this  day  ;  wherewith  they  have  forsaken  me,  and  served  other 
Gods  ;  so  do  they  also  unto  thee.  Now  therefore  hearken 
unto  their  voice,  howbeit,  protest  solemnly:  unto  them  and  show 
them  the  manner  of  the  king  that  shall  reign  over  them,  i.  e.  not 
of  any  particular  king,  but  the  general  manner  of  the  kings  oi 


COMMON    SENSE.  15 

the  earth,  whom  Israel  was  so  eagerly  copying  after.  And  not- 
withstanding the  great  distance  of  time  and  difference  of 
manners,  the  character  is  still  in  fashion.     And  Samuel  told 
aU  the  words  of  the  Lord  unto  ike  people,  that  asked  of  him 
a  king.    And  he  said,  This  shall  be  the  manner  of  the  king 
that  shall  reign  over  you  •  he  will  take  your  sons  and  appoint 
them  for  himself,  for  his  chariots,  and  to  be  his  horsemen, 
and  some  shall  run  before  his  chariots  (this  description  agrees 
with  the  present  mode  of  impressing  men)  and  he  will  ap- 
point him  captains  over  thousands,  and  captains  over  fifties, 
and  will  set  them  to  ear  his  ground  and  to  reap  his  harvest, 
and  to  make  his  instruments  of  war,  and  instruments  of  his 
chariots  ;  and  he  will  take  your  daughters  to  be  confection- 
aries,  and  to  be  cooks  and  to  be  bakers  (this  describes  the 
expense  and  luxury  as  well  as  the  oppression  of  kings)  and 
he  will  take  your  fields  and  your  olive  yards,  even  the  best  of 
them,  and  give  them  to  his  servants ;  and  he  will  take  the 
tenth  of  your  seed,  and  of  your  vineyards,  and  give  them  to 
his  officers  and  to  his  servants  (by  which  we  see  that  bribery, 
corruption,  and  favoritism,  are  the  standing  vices  of  kings) 
and  he  will  take  the  tenth  of  your  men  servants,  and  your 
maid  servants,  and  your  goodliest  young  men,  and  your 
asses,  and  put  them  to  his  work :  and  he  will  take  the  tenth 
of  your  sheep,  and  ye  shall  be  his  servants,  and  ye  shall  cry 
c-ut  in  that  day  because  of  your  king  which  ye  shall  have 
Chosen.     AND  THE  LOED  WILL  NOT  HEAK  YOU 
IN"  THAT  DAY.    This  accounts  for  the  continuation  of 
monarchy ;  neither  do  the  characters  of  the  few  good  kings 
which  have  lived  since,  either  sanctify  the  title,  or  blot  out 
the  sinfulness  of  the  origin :  the  high  encomium  given  of 
David  takes  no  notice  of  him  officially  as  a  king,  but  only  as 
a  man  after  God's  own  heart.   Nevertheless  the  people  refused 
to  obey  the  voice  of  Samuel,  and  they  said,  Nay,  out  we  will 
have  a  king  over  us,  that  we  may  be  like  all  the  nations,  and 
that  our  king  may  judge  us,  and  go  out  before  us  and  fight 
our  battles.     Samuel  continued  to  reason  with  them,  but  to 
no  purpose ;  he  set  before  them  their  ingratitude,  but  all 
would  not  avail ;  and  seeing  them  fully  bent  on  their  folly, 
he  cried  out,  I  will  call  unto  the  Lord,  and  he  shall  send 
thunder  and  rain  (which  was  then  a  punishment,  being  in 
the  time  of  wheat  harvest)  that  ye  may  perceive  and  see  that 
your  wickedness  is  great  which  ye  have  done  in  the  sight  of 
the  Lord,  IN  ASKING  YOU  A  KING.    So  Samuel  called 
unto  the  Lord,  and  the  Lord  sent  thunder  and  rain  that  day, 


16  COMMON    SENSE. 

and  all  the  people  greatly  feared  the  Lord  and  Samuel.  And 
all  the  people  said  unto  Samuel,  Pray  for  thy  servants  unto 
the  Lord  thy  God  that  we  die  not,  for  WE  HA  YE 
ADDED  UNTO  OUR  SINS  THIS  EVIL,  TO  ASK  A 
KINGr.  These  portions  of  scripture  are  direct  and  positive. 
They  admit  of  no  equivocal  construction.  That  the  Almighty 
hath  here  entered  his  protest  against  monarchical  govern 
ment  is  true,  or  the  scripture  is  false.  And  a  man  hath  good 
reason  to  believe  that  there  is  as  much  of  kingcraft,  as  priest- 
craft in  withholding  the  scripture  from  the  public  in  r  opish 
countries.  For  monarchy  in  every  instance  is  the  Popery  of 
government. 

To  the  evil  of  monarchy  we  have  added  that  of  hereditary 
succession ;  and  as  the  first  is  a  degradation  and  lessening 
of  ourselves,  so  the  second,  claimed  as  a  matter  of  right,  is 
an  insult  and  imposition  on  posterity.  For  all  men  being 
originally  equals,  no  one  by  bvrth,  could  have  a  right  to  set 
up  his  own  family,  in  perpetual  preference  to  all  others  for 
ever,  and  though  himself  might  deserve  some  decent  degree 
of  honours  of  his  cotemporaries,  yet  his  descendants  might 
be  far  too  unworthy  to  inherit  them.  One  of  the  strongest 
natwral  proofs  of  the  folly  of  hereditary  right  in  kings, 
is  that  nature  disapproves  it,  otherwise  she  would  not  so 
frequently  turn  it  into  ridicule,  by  giving  mankind  an  Ass 
for  a  Lion. 

Secondly,  as  no  man  at  first  could  possess  more  public 
honours  than  were  bestowed  upon  him,  so  the  givers  of  those 
honours  could  have  no  power  to  give  away  the  right  of  pos- 
terity, and  though  they  might  say  "  We  choose  you  for  our 
head,"  they  could  not,  without  manifest  injustice  to  their 
children,  say  "that  your  children  and  your  children's  chil- 
dren shall  reign  over  ours  for  ever."  Because  such  an  un- 
wise, unjust,  unnatural  compact  might,  (perhaps)  in  the  next 
succession  put  them  under  the  government  of  «  rogue,  or  a 
fool.  Most  wise  men  in  their  private  sentiments,  nave  ever 
treated  hereditary  right  with  contempt ;  yet  it  is  one  of  those 
evils,  which  when  once  established  is  not  easily  removed  ; 
many  submit  from  fear,  others  from  superstition,  and  the 
more  powerful  part  shares,  with  the  king,  the  plunder  of 
the  rest. 

This  is  supposing  the  present  race  of  kings  in  the  world 
to  have  had  an  honourable  origin ;  whereas  it  is  more  than 
probable,  that  could  we  take  off  the  dark  covering  of  anti- 
quity, and  trace  them  to  their  first  rise,  we  should  find  the 


COMMON    SENSE.  IT 

first  of  them  nothing  better  than  the  principal  ruffian  of 
some  restless  gang,  whose  savage  manners,  or  pre-eminence 
in  subtilty  obtained  him  the  title  of  chief  among  plunder- 
ers ;  and  who  by  increasing  in  power,  and  extending  his 
depredations,  overawed  the  quiet  and  defenceless  to  pur- 
chase their  safety  by  frequent  contributions.  Yet  his  elec- 
tors could  have  no  idea  of  giving  hereditary  right  to  his 
descendants,  because  such  a  perpetual  exclusion  of  them- 
selves was  incompatible  with  the  free  and  unrestained  prin- 
ciples they  professed  to  live  by.  Wherefore,  hereditary 
succession  in  the  early  ages  of  monarchy  could  not  take 
place  as  a  matter  of  claim,  but  as  something  casual  or  com- 

Slimental ;  but  as  few  or  no  records  were  extant  in  those 
ays,  and  traditionary  history  stuffed  with  fables,  it  was  very 
easy,  after  the  lapse  of  a  few  generations,  to  trump  up  some 
superstitious  tale,  conveniently  timed  Mahomet  like,  to  cram 
hereditary  rights  down  the  throats  of  the  vulgar.  Perhaps 
the  disorders  which  threatened,  or  seemed  to  threaten,  on 
the  decease  of  a  leader  and  the  choice  of  a  new  one  (for 
elections  among  ruffians  could  not  be  very  orderly)  induced 
many  at  first  to  favor  hereditary  pretensions;  by  which 
means  it  happened,  as  it  hath  happened  since,  that  what  at 
first  was  submitted  to  as  a  convenience,  was  afterwards 
claimed  as  a  right. 

England,  since  the  conquest,  hath  known  some  few  good 
monarchs,  but  groaned  beneath  a  much  larger  number  of 
bad  ones ;  vet  no  man  in  his  senses  can  say  that  their  claim 
under  William  the  Conqueror  is  a  very  honorable  one.  A 
French  bastard  landing  with  an  armea  banditti,  and  estab- 
lishing himself  king  of  England  against  the  consent  of  the 
natives,  is  in  plain  terms  a  very  paltry  rascally  original.  It 
certainly  hath  no  divinity  in  it.  However,  it  is  needless  to 
spend  much  time  in  exposing  the  folly  of  hereditary  right, 
if  there  are  any  so  weak  as  to  believe  it,  let  them  promiscu- 
ously worship  the  ass  and  the  lion,  and  welcome.  I  shall 
neither  copy  their  humility,  nor  disturb  their  devotion. 

Yet  I  should  be  glad  to  ask  how  they  suppose  kings  came 
at  first?  The  question  admits  but  of  three  answers,  viz. 
either  by  lot,  by  election,  or  by  usurpation.  If  the  first  king 
was  taken  by  lot,  it  establishes  a  precedent  for  the  next, 
which  excludes  hereditary  succession.  Saul  was  by  lot,  yet 
the  succession  was  not  nereditary,  neither  does  it  appear 
from  that  transaction  that  there  was  any  intention  it  ever 
•hould  be.  If  the  first  king  of  any  country  was  by  election. 


18  COMMON    SENSE. 

that  likewise  establishes  a  precedent  for  the  next ;  for  to  Bay, 
that  the  right  of  all  future  generations  is  taken  away,  by 
the  act  of  the  first  electors,  in  their  choice  not  only  of  a 
king,  but  of  a  family  of  kings  forever,  hath  no  parallel  in 
or  out  of  scripture  but  the  doctrine  of  original  sin,  which 
supposes  the  free  will  of  all  men  lost  in  Adam ;  and  from 
such  comparison,  and  it  will  admit  of  no  other,  hereditary 
succession  can  derive  no  glory.  For  as  in  Adam  all  sinned, 
and  as  in  the  first  electors  all  men  obeyed ;  as  in  the  one  all 
mankind  were  subjected  to  Satan,  and  in  the  other  to  sove- 
reignty ;  as  our  innocence  was  lost  in  the  first,  and  our 
autnority  in  the  last ;  and  as  both  disable  us  from  re-assum- 
ing some  former  state  and  privilege,  it  unanswerably  follows 
that  original  sin  and  hereditary  succession  are  parallels.  Dis- 
honorable rank!  Inglorious  connection!  Yet  the  most 
subtile  sophist  cannot  produce  a  juster  simile. 

As  to  usurpation,  no  man  will  be  so  hardy  as  to  defend 
it ;  and  that  William  the  Conqueror  was  an  usurper  is  a  fact 
not  to  be  contradicted.  The  plain  truth  is,  that  the  anti- 
quity of  English  monarchy  will  not  bear  looking  into. 

But  it  is  not  so  much  the  absurdity  as  the  evil  of  heredi- 
tary succession  which  concerns  mankind.  Did  it  ensure  a 
race  of  good  and  wise  men  it  would  have  the  seal  of  divine 
authority,  but  as  it  opens  a  door  to  thefooHsft,  the  wicked, 
and  the  improper,  it  hath  in  it  the  nature  of  oppression. 
Men  who  look  upon  themselves  born  to  reign,  and  others  to 
obey,  soon  grow  insolent ;  selected  from  the  rest  of  mankind 
their  minds  are  early  poisoned  by  importance;  and  the 
world  they  act  in  differs  so  materially  from  the  world  at 
large,  that  they  have  but  little  opportunity  of  knowing  its 
true  interests,  and  when  they  succeed  to  the  government  are 
frequently  the  most  ignorant  and  unfit  of  any  throughout 
the  dominions. 

Another  evil  which  attends  hereditary  succession  is,  that 
the  throne  is  subject  to  be  possessed  by  a  minor  at  any  age ; 
all  which  time  the  regency  acting  under  the  cover  of  a  king, 
have  every  opportunity  and  inducement  to  betray  their 
trust.  The  same  national  misfortune  happens,  when  a  king, 
worn  out  with  age  and  infirmity,  enters  the  last  stage  of  human 
weakness.  ,  In  both  these  cases  the  public  becomes  the  prey 
to  every  miscreant,  who  can  tamper  successfully  with  the 
follies  either  of  age  or  infancy. 

The  most  plausible  plea,  which  hath  ever  teen  offered  in 
favor  of  hereditary  succession,  is,  that  it  preserves  a  natiou 


COMMON    SENSE.  19 

from  civil  wars :  and  were  this  true,  it  would  be  weighty ; 
whereas,  it  is  the  most  barefaced  falsity  ever  imposed  ujpon 
mankind.  The  whole  history  of  England  disowns  the  met. 
Thirty  kings  and  two  minors  have  reigned  in  that  distracted 
kingdom  since  the  conquest,  in  which  time  there  have  been 
(including  the  revolution)  no  less  than  eight  civil  wars  and 
nineteen  rebellions.  Wherefore  instead  of  making  for  peace, 
it  makes  against  it,  and  destroys  the  very  foundation  it 
seems  to  stand  upon. 

The  contest  for  monarchy  and  succession,  between  the 
houses  of  York  and  Lancaster,  laid  England  in  a  scene  of 
blood  for  many  years.  Twelve  pitched  battles,  besides  skir- 
mishes and  sieges,  were  fought  between  Henry  and  Edward, 
twice  was  Henry  prisoner  to  Edward,  who  in  his  turn  was 
prisoner  to  Henry.  And  so  uncertain  is  the  fate  of  war 
and  the  temper  of  a  nation,  when  nothing  but  personal 
matters  are  the  ground  of  a  quarrel,  that  Henry  was  taken 
in  triumph  from  a  prison  to  a  palace,  and  Edward  obliged 
to  fly  from  a  palace  to  a  foreign  land ;  yet,  as  sudden  tran- 
sitions of  temper  are  seldom  lasting,  Henry  in  his  turn  was 
driven  from  the  throne,  and  Edward  recalled1  to  succeed  him. 
The  parliament  always  following  the  strongest  side. 

This  contest  began  in  the  reign  of  Henry  the  Sixth,  and 
was  not  entirely  extinguished  till  Henry  the  Seventh,  in 
whom  the  families  were  united.  Including  a  period  of  67 
years,  viz.  from  1422  to  1489. 

In  short,  monarchy  and  succession  have  laid  (not  this  or 
that  kingdom  only,)  but  the  world  in  blood  and  ashes.  "Us 
a  form  of  government  which  the  word  of  God  bears  testi- 
mony against,  and  blood  will  attend  it. 

If  we  inquire  into  the  business  of  a  king,  we  shall  find 
(and  in  some  countries  they  have  none)  that  after  sauntering 
away  their  lives  without  pleasure  to  themselves  or  advan- 
tage to  the  nation,  they  withdraw  from  the  scene,  and  leave 
their  successors  to  tread  the  same  useless  and  idle  round.  In 
absolute  monarchies  the  whole  weight  of  business,  civil  and 
military,  lies  on  the  king ;  the  children  of  Israel  in  their 
request  for  a  king,  urged  this  plea,  "  that  he  may  judge  us 
and  go  out  before  us  and  fight  our  battles."  But  in  countries 
where  he  is  neither  a  judge  nor  a  general,  as  in  England,  a 
man  would  be  puzzled  to  Know  what  is  his  business. 

The  nearer  any  government  approaches  to  a  republic,  the 
less  business  there  is  for  a  king.  It  is  somewhat  difficult  to 
find  a  proper  name  for  the  government  of  England.  Sb 


20  COMMON   SENSE. 

William  Meredith  calls  it  a  republic ;  but  in  its  present  state 
it  is  unworthy  of  the  name,  because  the  corrupt  influence 
of  the  crown,  by  having  all  the  places  at  its  disposal,  hath 
so  effectually  swallowed  up  the  power,  and  eaten  out  the 
virtue  of  the  house  of  commons  (the  republican  part  in  the 
constitution)  that  the  government  of  England  is  nearly 
as  monarchical  as  that  of  France  or  Spain.  Men  fall  out 
with  names  without  understanding  them.  For  it  is  the 
republican  and  not  the  monarchical  part  of  the  constitution 
of  England  which  Englishmen  glory  in,  viz.  the  liberty  of 
choosing  a  house  of  commons  from  out  of  their  own  body — 
and  it  is  easy  to  see  that  when  republican  virtue  fails,  slavery 
ensues.  Why  is  the  constitution  of  England  sickly,  but 
because  monarchy  hath  poisoned  the  republic,  the  crown 
hath  engrossed  the  commons. 

In  England  a  king  hath  little  more  to  do  than  to  make 
war  and  give  away  places;  which,  in  plain  terms,  is  to 
impoverish  the  nation,  and  set  it  together  by  the  ears.  A 
pretty  business  indeed  for  a  man  to  be  allowed  eight  hun- 
dred thousand  sterling  a  year  for,  and  worshipped  into  the 
bargain !  Of  more  worth  is  one  honest  man  to  society,  and 
in  the  sight  of  God,  than  all  the  crowned  ruffians  that  ever 
ived. 


THOUGHTS  ON  THE 

PRESENT  STATE  OF  THE  AMERICAN  AFFAIRS. 

IN  the  following  pages  I  offer  nothing  more  than  simple 
facts,  plain  arguments,  and  common  sense ;  and  have  no 
other  preliminaries  to  settle  with  the  reader,  than  that  he 
will  divest  himself  of  prejudice  and  prepossession,  and  suffer 
his  reason  and  his  feelings  to  determine  for  themselves  ;  that 
he  will  put  on,  or  rather  that  he  will  not  put  off  the  true  cha- 
racter of  a  man,  and  generously  enlarge  his  views  beyond 
the  present  day. 

volumes  have  been  written  on  the  subject  of  the  struggle 
between  England  and  America.  Men  of  all  ranks  have 
embarked  in  the  controversy,  from  different  motives,  and 
with  various  designs ;  but  all  have  been  ineffectual,  and 
the  period  of  debate  is  closed.  Arms,  as  the  last  resource 


COMMON    SENSE.  91 

must  decide  the  contest ;  the  appeal  was  the  choice  of  the 
king,  and  the  continent  hath  accepted  the  challenge 

It  has  been  reported  of  the  late  Mr.  Pelham  (who,  though 
an  able  minister  was  not  without  his  faults)  that  on  his  be- 
ing attacked  in  the  house  of  commons,  on  the  score,  that  his 
measures  were  only  of  a  temporary  kind,  replied,  "  they  will 
last  my  time"  Should  a  thought  so  fatal  or  unmanly  pos- 
sess the  colonies  in  the  present  contest,  the  name  of  an- 
cestors will  be  remembered  by  future  generations  with  detes- 
tation. 

The  sun  never  shone  on  a  cause  of  greater  worth.  Tis 
not  the  affair  of  a  city,  a  county,  a  province,  or  a  kingdom, 
but  of  a  continent — of  at  least  one-eighth  part  of  the  habit- 
able globe.  'Tis  not  the  concern  of  a  day,  a  year,  or  an 
age ;  posterity  are  virtually  involved  in  the  contest,  and  will 
be  more  or  less  affected  even  to  the  end  of  time,  by  the  pro- 
ceedings now.  Now  is  the  seed-time  of  continental  union, 
faith  and  honor.  The  least  fracture  now  will  be  like  a 
name  engraved  with  the  point  of  a  pin  on  the  tender  rind  of 
a  young  oak ;  the  wound  will  enlarge  with  the  tree,  and  pos- 
terity read  it  in  full  grown  characters.  • 

By  referring  the  matter  from  argument  to  arms,  a  new 
area  for  politics  is  struck  ;  a  new  method  of  thinking  hath 
arisen.  All  plans,  proposals,  etc.  prior  to  the  nineteenth  of 
April,  i.  e.  to  the  commencement  of  hostilities,  are  like  the 
almanacks  of  last  year ;  which,  though  proper  then,  are 
superseded  and  useless  now.  Whatever  was  advanced  by 
the  advocates  on  either  side  of  the  question  then,  terminated 
in  one  and  the  same  point,  viz.  a  union  with  Great  Britain ; 
the  only  difference  between  the  parties  was  the  method  of 
effecting  it ;  the  one  proposing  force,  the  other  friendship ; 
but  it  hath  so  far  happened  that  the  first  has  failed,  and 
the  second  has  withdrawn  her  influence. 

As  much  hath  been  said  of  the  advantages  of  reconcilia- 
tion, which,  like  an  agreeable  dream,  hath  passed  away  and 
left  us  as  we  were,  it  is  but  right  that  we  should  examine 
the  contrary  side  of  the  argument,  and  inquire  into  some  of 
the  many  material  injuries  which  these  colonies  sustain,  and 
always  will  sustain,  by  being  connected  with  and  dependant 
on  Great  Britain.  To  examine  that  connection  and  depend- 
ance,  on  the  principles  of  nature  and  common  sense,  to  see 
what  we  have  to  trust  to,  if  separated,  and  what  we  are  to 
expect,  if  dependant. 

I  have  heard  it  asserted  by  some  that  as  America  haa 


22  COMMON    SENSE. 

flourished  under  her  former  connexion  with  Great  Britain, 
the  same  connexion  is  necessary  towards  her  future  happi- 
ness, and  will  always  have  the  same  effect.  Nothing  can 
be  more  fallacious  than  this  kind  of  argument.  We  may  as 
well  assert  that  because  a  child  has  thrived  upon  milk,  that 
it  is  never  to  have  meat,  or  that  the  first  twenty  years  of 
our  lives  is  to  become  a  precedent  for  the  next  twenty. 
But  even  this  is  admitting  more  than  is  true,  for  I  answer 
roundly,  that  America  would  have  flourished  as  much,  and 
probably  much  more,  had  no  European  power  had  any 
thing  to  do  with  her.  The  articles  of  commerce,  by  which 
she  has  enriched  herself,  are  the  necessaries  of  life,  and  will 
always  have  a  market  while  eating  is  the  custom  of  Europe. 

But  she  has  protected  us,  say  some.  That  she  hath  en- 
grossed us  is  true,  and  defended  the  continent  at  our  ex- 
pense as  well  as  her  own,  is  admitted,  and  she  would  have 
defended  Turkey  from  the  same  motives,  viz.  for  the  sake  of 
trade  and  dominion. 

Alas !  we  have  been  long  led  away  by  ancient  prejudices, 
and  made  large  sacrifices  to  superstition.  We  have  boasted 
the  protection  of  Great  Britain,  without  considering,  that 
her  motive  was  interest,  not  attachment  /  and  that  she  did 
not  protect  us  from  our  enemies  on  our  account,  but  from 
her  enemies  on  her  own  account,  from  those  who  had  no 
quarrel  with  us  on  any  other  account,  and  who  will  aways 
be  our  enemies  on  the  same  account.  Let  Britain  waive  her 
pretentions  to  the  continent,  or  the  continent  throw  off  the 
dependance,  and  we  should  be  at  peace  with  France  and 
Spain,  were  they  at  war  with  Britain.  The  miseries  of 
Hanover  last  war  ought  to  warn  us  against  connexions. 

It  hath  lately  been  asserted  in  parliament,  that  the  colo- 
nies have  no  relation  to  each  other  but  through  the  parent 
country,  i.  e.  that  Pennsylvania  and  the  Jerseys,  and  so  on 
for  the  rest,  are  sister  colonies  by  way  of  England ;  that  is 
certainly  a  very  round-about  way  of  proving  relationship, 
but  it  is  the  nearest  and  only  true  way  of  proving  enemy- 
ship,  if  I  may  so  call  it.  France  and  Spain  never  were,  nor 
perhaps  ever  will  be,  our  enemies  as  Americans,  but  as  our 
being  the  subjects  of  Great  Britavn. 

But  Britain  is  the  parent  country  say  some.  Then  the 
more  shame  upon  her  conduct.  Even  brutes  do  not  devour 
their  young,  nor  savages  make  war  upon  their  families ; 
wherefore,  the  assertion,  if  true,  turns  to  her  reproach ;  but 
it  happens  not  to  be  true,  or  only  partly  so,  and  the  phras* 


COMMON   SENSE.  98 

parent  or  mother  country  hath  been  jee  critically  adopted  by 
the  king  and  his  parasites,  with  a  low  papistical  design  of 
gaining  an  unfair  bias  on  the  credulous  weakness  of  our 
minds.  Europe,  and  not  England,  is  the  parent  country  of 
America.  This  new  world  hath  been  the  asylum  for  the 
persecuted  lovers  of  civil  and  religious  liberty  from  every 
part  of  Europe.  Hither  have  they  ned,  not  from  the  tender 
embraces  of  the  mother,  but  from  the  cruelty  of  the  mon- 
ster ;  and  it  is  so  far  true  of  England,  that  the  same  tyranny 
which  drove  the  first  emigrants  from  home,  pursues  their 
descendants  still. 

In  this  extensive  quarter  of  the  globe,  we  forget  the  nar- 
~ow  limits  of  three  nundred  and  sixty  miles  (the  extent  of 
England)  and  carry  our  friendship  on  a  larger  scale ;  we 
claim  brotherhood  with  every  Europea"n  Christian,  and 
triumph  in  the  generosity  of  the  sentiment. 

It  is  pleasant  to  observe  with  what  regular  gradations  we 
surmount  local  prejudices,  as  we  enlarge  our  acquaintance 
with  the  world.  A  man  born  in  any  town  in  England 
divided  into  parishes,  will  naturally  associate  with  most  of 
his  fellow  parishioners  (because  their  interest  in  many  cases 
will  be  common)  and  distinguish  him  by  the  name  of  neigh- 
bor ;  if  he  meet  him  but  a  few  miles  from  home,  he  drops 
the  narrow  idea  of  a  street,  and  salutes  him  by  the  name  of 
townsman  /  if  he  travel  out  of  the  county,  and  meets  him  in 
any  other,  he  forgets  the  minor  divisions  of  street  and  town, 
and  calls  him  countryman,  i.  e.  counfyman  ;  but  if  in  their 
foreign  excursions  they  should  associate  in  France  or  any 
other  part  of  Ji/urope,  their  local  remembrance  would  be  en- 
larged into  that  or  Englishman.  And  by  a  just  parity  of 
reasoning,  all  Europeans  meeting  in  America,  or  any  other 
quarter  of  the  globe,  are  coimtrymen  /  for  England,  Holland, 
Germany,  or  Sweden,  when  compared  with  the  whole,  stand 
in  the  same  places  on  the  larger  scale,  which  the  divisions  of 
street,  town,  and  county  do  on  the  smaller  one ;  distinctions 
too  limited  for  continental  minds.  Not  one  third  of  the  in- 
habitants, even  of  this  province,  are  of  English  descent. 
Wherefore,  I  reprobate  the  phrase  of  parent  or  mother 
country  applied  to  England  only,  as  being  false,  selfish,  nar- 
row and  ungenerous. 

But,  admitting  that  we  were  all  of  English  descent,  what  does 
it  amount  to  ?  Nothing.  Britain  being  now  an  open  enemy, 
extinguishes  every  other  name  and  title:  and 'to  say  that 
reconciliation  is  our  duty  is  truly  farcical.  The  first  king 


24  COMMON   SENSE. 

of  England,  of  the  present  line  (William  the  Conqueror)  was 
Frenchman,  and  half  the  peers  of  England  are  descendants 
from  the  same  country ;  wherefore,  by  the  same  method  of 
reasoning,  England  ought  to  be  governed  by  France. 

Much  nath  been  said  of  the  united  strength  of  Britain  and 
the  colonies,  that  in  conjunction  they  might  bid  defiance  to 
the  world.  But  this  is  mere  presumption ;  the  fate  of  war 
is  uncertain,  neither  do  the  expressions  mean  any  thing ;  for 
this  continent  would  never  suffer  itself  to  be  drained  of 
inhabitants,  to  support  the  British  arms  in  either  Asia, 
Africa,  or  Europe. 

Besides,  what  have  we  to  do  with  setting  the  world  at 
defiance  ?  Our  plan  is  commerce,  and  that,  we?l  attended 
to,  will  secure  us, the  peace  and  friendship  of  all  iiaro^e; 
because  it  is  the  interest  of  all  Europe  to  have  An.  erica 
&  free  port.  Her  trade  will  always  be  a  protection,  and  her 
barrenness  of  gold  and  silver  secure  her  from  invaders. 

I  challenge  the  warmest  advocate  for  reconciliation,  to 
show  a  single  advantage  that  this  continent  can  reap,  by 
being  connected  with  Great  Britain.  I  repeat  the  challenge ; 
not  a  single  advantage  is  derived.  Our  corn  will  fetch  its 
price  in  any  ki<*rket  in  Europe,  and  our  imported  good* 
must  be  paid  for,  buy  then)  where  we  will. 

But  the  injuries  aiid  disadvantages  which  we  sustain  by 
that  connexion,  are  without  number ;  and  our  duty  to  man- 
kind at  large,  as  well  as  to  ourselves,  instructs  us  to  renounce 
the  alliance;  because,  any  submission  to  or  dependence  on 
Great  Britain,  tends  directly  to  involve  this  continent  in 
European  wars  and  quairels ;  and  sets  us  at  variance  with 
nations,  who  would  otherwise  seek  oar  friendship,  and 
against  whom,  we  have  neither  anger  nor  complaint.  AE 
Europe  is  our  market  for  trade,  we  ought  to  form  no  partial 
connexion  with  any  part  of  it.  It  is  the  true  interest  of 
America  to  steer  clear  of  European  contentions,  which  she 
never  can  do,  while,  by  her  dependence  on  Britain,  she  is 
made  the  make- weight  in  the  scale  of  British  politics. 

Europe  is  too  thickly  planted  with  kingdoms  to  be  long 
at  peace,  and  whenever  a  war  breaks  out  between  England 
and  any  foreign  power,  the  trade  of  America  goes  to  ruin. 
because  of  her  connexion  with  Britain.  The  next  war  may 
not  turn  out  like  the  last,  and  should  it  not,  the  advocates 
for  reconciliation  now  will  be  wishing  for  separation  then, 
because,  neutrality  in  that  case,  would  be  a  safer  convoy 
than  a  man  of  war.  Every  thing  that  is  right  or  natural 


OOMMOfl    8KK8&.  2fr 

pleads  for  separation.  The  blood  of  the  slain,  the  weeping- 
voice  of  nature  cries,  "*tis  time  to  pcvrt.  Even  the  distance 
at  which  the  Almighty  hath  placed  England  and  America, 
is  a  strong  and  natural  proof,  that  the  authority  of  the  one 
over  the  other,  was  never  the  design  of  heaven.  The  time 
likewise  at  which  the  continent  was  discovered,  adds  weight 
to  the  argument,  and  the  manner  in  which  it  was  peopled, 
increases  the  force  of  it.  The  reformation  was  precedea  by 
the  discovery  of  America,  as  if  the  Almighty  graciously 
meant  to  open  a  sanctuary  to  the  persecuted  in  future  years, 
when  home  should  afford  neither  friendship  nor  safety. 

The  authority  of  Great  Britain  over  this  continent,  is 
a  form  of  government,  which  sooner  or  later  must  have  an 
end  :  and  a  serious  mind  can  draw  no  true  pleasure  by  look- 
ing forward  under  the  painful  and  positive  conviction,  that 
what  he  calls  "  the  present  constitution,"  is  merely  tempo- 
rary. As  parents,  we  can  have  no  joy,  knowing  that  this 
government  is  not  sufficiently  lasting  to  ensure  any  thing 
which  we  may  bequeath  to  posterity ;  and  by  a  plain  me- 
thod of  argument,  as  we  are  running  the  next  generation 
into  debt,  we  ought  to  do  the  work  of  it,  otherwise  we  use 
them  meanly  and  pitifully.  In  order  to  discover  the  line  of 
our  duty  rightly,  we  should  take  our  children  in  our  hand, 
and  fix  our  station  a  few  years  farther  into  life ;  that  emi- 
nence will  present  a  prospect,  which  a  few  present  fears  and 
prejudices  conceal  from  our  sight. 

Though  I  would  carefully  avoid  giving  unnecessary  of- 
fence, yet  I  am  inclined  to  believe,  that  all  those  who  espouse 
the  doctrine  of  reconciliation,  may  be  included  within  the 
following  descriptions. 

Interested  men,  who  are  not  to  be  trusted ;  weak  men, 
who  cannot  see ;  prejudiced  men,  who  witt  not  see ;  and  a 
certain  set  of  moderate  men,  who  think  better  of  the  Euro- 
pean world  than  it  deserves :  and  this  last  class,  by  an  ill- 
judged  deliberation,  will  be  the  cause  of  more  calamities  to 
this  continent  than  all  the  other  three. 

It  is  the  good  fortune  of  many  to  live  distant  from  the 
scene  of  sorrow ;  the  evil  is  not  sufficiently  brought  to  their 
doors  to  make  them  feel  the  precariousness  with  which  all 
American  property  is  possessed.  But  let  our  imaginations 
transport  us  a  few  moments  to  Boston ;  that  seat  of  wretch- 
edness will  teach  us  wisdom,  and  instruct  us  forever  to  re- 
nounce a  power  in  whom  we  can  have  no  trust.  The  inha- 
bitants of  that  unfortunate  city,  who  1m  r  :\.  few  nr.nthp. ago 


26  COMMON    SENSE. 

were  in  ease  and  affluence,  have  now  no  other  alternative 
than  to  stay  and  starve,  or  turn  out  to  beg.  Endangered  by 
the  fire  of  their  friends  if  they  continue  within  the  city,  and 
plundered  by  the  soldiery  if  they  leave  it.  In  their  present 
situation  they  are  prisoners  without  the  hope  of  redemption, 
and  in  a  general  attack  for  their  relief,  they  would  be  ex- 
posed to  the  fury  of  both  armies. 

Men  of  passive  tempers  look  somewhat  lightly  over  the 
offences  of  Britain,  and,  still  hoping  for  the  best,  are  apt  to 
call  out,  "  come,  come,  we  shall  ~be  friends  again,  for  all  tnis" 
But  examine  the  passions  and  feelings  of  mankind,  bring 
the  doctrine  of  reconciliation  to  the  touchstone  of  nature, 
and  then  tell  me,  whether  you  can  hereafter  love,  honor, 
and  faithfully  serve  the  power  that  hath  carried  fire  and 
Bword  into  your  land  ?  If  you  cannot  do  all  these,  then  are 
j  «i  only  deceiving  yourselves,  and  by  your  delay  bringing 
ruin  upon  your  posterity.  Your  future  connexion  with  Bri- 
tain, whom  you  can  neither  love  nor  honor,  will  be  forced 
and  unnatural,  and  being  formed  only  on  the  plan  of  pre- 
sent convenience,  will  in  a  little  time  fall  into  a  relapse 
more  wretched  than  the  first.  But  if  you  say,  you  can  still 
pass  the  violations  over,  then  I  ask,  hath  your  house  been 
burnt?  Hath  your  property  been  destroyed  before  your 
face  ?  Are  your  wife  and  children  destitute  of  a  bed  to  lie 
on,  or  bread  to  live  on  ?  Have  you  lost  a  parent  or  a  child 
bv  their  hands,  and  yourself  the  ruined  and  wretched  sur- 
vivor? If  you  have  not,  then  are  you  not  a  judge  of  those 
who  have?  But  if  you  have,  and  can  still  shake  hands 
with  the  murderers,  then  are  you  unworthy  the  name  of 
husband,  father,  friend,  or  lover,  and  whatever  may  be  your 
rank  or  title  in  life,  you  have  the  heart  of  a  coward,  and  the 
spirit  of  a  sycophant. 

This  is  not  inflaming  or  exaggerating  matters,  but  trying 
them  by  those  feelings  and  affections  which  nature  justifies, 
and  without  which,  we  should  be  incapable  of  discharging 
the  social  duties  of  life,  or  enjoying  the  felicities  of  it.  I 
mean  not  to  exhibit  horror  for  the  purpose  of  provoking  re- 
venge, but  to  awaken  us  from  fatal  and  unmanly  slumbers, 
that  we  may  pursue  determinately  some  fixed  object.  It  is 
not  in  the  power  of  Britain  or  of  Europe  to  conquer  Ame- 
rica, if  she  does  not  conquer  herself  by  delay  and  timidity 
The  present  winter  is  worth  an  age  if  rightly  employed,  but 
if  lost  or  neglected,  the  whole  continent  will  partake  of  the 
misfortune ;  and  there  is  no  punishment  which  that  man 


COMMON    SENSE.  37 

•mil  not  deserve,  be  he  who?  or  wnat,  or  where  he  will,  that 
may  be  the  means  of  sacrificing  a  season  so  precious  and 
useful. 

It  is  repugnant  to  reason,  and  the  universal  order  of 
things,  to  all  examples  from  former  ages,  to  suppose  that 
this  continent  can  longer  remain  subject  to  any  external 
power.  The  most  sanguine  in  Britain,  do  not  think  so. 
The  utmost  stretch  of  human  wisdom  cannot,  at  this  time, 
compass  a  plan  short  of  separation,  which  can  promise  the 
continent  even  a  year's  security.  Reconciliation  is  now  a 
fallacious  dream.  Nature  hath  deserted  the  connexion,  and 
art  cannot  supply  her  place.  For,  as  Milton  wisely  expresses, 
"never  can  true  reconcilement  grow,  where  wounds  of 
deadly  hate  have  pierced  so  deep. 

Every  quiet  method  for  peace  hath  been  ineffectual.  Our 
prayers  have  been  rejected  with  disdain ;  and  only  tended 
to  convince  us  that  nothing  flatters  vanity,  or  confirms  ob- 
stinacy in  kings  more  than  repeated  petitioning — nothing 
hath  contributed  more  than  this  very  measure  to  make  the 
kings  of  Europe  absolute :  witness  Denmark  and  Sweden. 
Wherefore,  since  nothing  but  blows  will  do,  for  God's  sake 
let  us  come  to  a  final  separation,  and  not  leave  the  next  ge- 
neration to  be  cutting  throats,  under  the  violated  unmeaning 
names  of  parent  and  child. 

To  say  they  will  never  attempt  it  again,  is  idle  and  vision- 
ary ;  we  thought  so  at  the  repeal  of  the  stamp  act,  yet  a 
year  or  two  undeceived  us :  as  well  may  we  suppose  that 
nations,  which  have  been  once  defeated,  will  never  renew 
the  quarrel. 

As  to  government  matters,  it  is  not  in  the  power  of  Bri- 
tain to  do  this  continent  justice:  the  business  of  it  wiil 
goon  be  too  weighty  and  intricate  to  be  managed  with  any 
tolerable  degree  of  convenience,  by  a  power  so  distant  from 
us,  and  so  very  ignorant  of  us ;  for  if  they  cannot  conquer 
us,  they  cannot  govern  us.  To  be  always  running  three  or 
four  thousand  miles  with  a  tale  or  a  petition,  waiting  four 
or  five  months  for  an  answer,  which,  when  obtained,  requires 
five  or  six  more  to  explain  it  in,  will  in  a  few  years  be 
looked  upon  as  folly  and  childishness — there  was  a  time 
when  it  was  proper,  and  there  is  a  proper  time  for  it  to 
cease. 

Small  islands,  not  capable  of  protecting  themselves,  are 
the  proper  objects  for  kingdoms  to  take  under  their  care ; 
hut  there  is  something  absurd,  in  supposing  a  continent  to 


28  COMMON   SENSE. 

be  perpetually  governed  by  an  island.  In  no  instance  hath 
nature  made  the  satellite  larger  than  its  primary  planet ;  and 
as  England  and  America,  with  respect  to  each  other,  reverse* 
the  common  order  of  nature,  it  is  evident  that  they  belong 
to  different  systems :  England  to  Europe — America  to  itself. 

I  am  not  induced  by  motives  of  pride,  party,  or  resent- 
ment, to  espouse  the  doctrine  of  separation  and  indepen- 
dence; I  am  clearly,  positively,  and  conscientiously  per- 
suaded that  it  is  the  true  interest  of  this  continent  to  be  so ; 
that  every  thing  short  of  that  is  mere  patchwork ;  that  it 
can  afford  no  lasting  felicity, — that  it  is  leaving  the  sword 
to  our  children,  and  shrinking  back  at  a  time,  when  going 
a  little  further  would  have  rendered  this  continent  the  glory 
of  the  earth. 

As  Britain  hath  not  manifested  the  least  inclination 
towards  a  compromise,  we  may  be  assured  that  no  terms 
can  be  obtained  worthy  the  acceptance  of  the  continent,  or 
any  ways  equal  to  the  expense  of  blood  and  treasure  we 
have  been  already  put  to. 

The  object  contended  for,  ought  always  to  bear  some  just 
proportion  to  the  expense.  The  removal  of  North,  or  the 
whole  detestable  junto,  is  a  matter  unworthy  the  millions 
we  have  expended.  A  temporary  stoppage  of  trade,  was  an 
inconvenience  which  would  nave  sufficiently  balanced  the  re- 
peal of  all  the  acts  complained  of,  had  such  repeals  been 
obtained ;  but  if  the  whole  continent  must  take  up  arms,  if 
every  man  must  be  a  soldier,  it  is  scarcely  worth  our  while 
to  nght  against  a  contemptible  ministry  only.  Dearly, 
dearly  do  we  pay  for  the  repeal  of  the  acts,  if  that  is  all  we 
fight  for ;  for,  in  a  just  estimation,  it  is  as  great  a  folly  to  pay 
a  Bunker-hill  price  for  law  as  for  land.  I  have  always  con- 
sidered the  independency  of  this  continent,  as  an  event  which 
sooner  or  later  must  take  place,  and,  from  the  late  rapid 
progress  of  the  continent  to  maturity,  the  event  cannot  be 
far  off.  Wherefore,  on  the  breaking  out  of  hostilities,  it  was 
not  worth  the  while  to  have  disputed  a  matter  which  time 
would  have  finally  redressed,  unless  we  meant  to  be  in  ear- 
nest ;  otherwise,  it  is  like  wasting  an  estate  on  a  suit  at  law, 
to  regulate  the  trespasses  of  a  tenant,  whose  lease  is  just  ex- 
piring. No  man  was  a  warmer  wisher  for  a  reconciliation 
than  myself,  before  the  fatal  nineteenth  of  April,  1775,*  but 
the  moment  the  event  of  that  day  was  made  known,  I  rejected 
the  hardened,  sullen-tempered  Pharaoh  of  England  for  ever : 

*  Massacre  at  Lexington. 


COMMON    SENSE.  29 

and  disdain  the  wretch,  that  with  the  pretended  title  of 
Father  of  his  people,  can  unfeelingly  hear  of  their  slaughter, 
and  composedly  sleep  with  their  blood  upon  his  soul. 

But  admitting  that  matters  were  now  made  up,  what 
would  be  the  event  ?  I  answer,  the  ruin  of  the  continent. 
And  that  for  several  reasons. 

1st,  The  powers  of  governing  still  remaining  in  the  hands 
of  the  king,  he  will  have  a  negative  over  the  whole  legisla- 
tion of  this  continent.  And  as  he  hath  shown  himself  such 
an  inveterate  enemy  to  liberty,  and  discovered  such  a  thirst 
for  arbitrary  power :  is  he,  or  is  he  not,  a  proper  person  to 
say  to  these  colonies,  "  you  shatt  make  no  laws  but  what  I 
please  t"  And  is  there  any  inhabitant  of  America  so  igno- 
rant as  not  to  know,  that  according  to  what  is  called  the 
present  constitution,  this  continent  can  make  no  laws  but 
what  the  king  gives  leave  to  ?  and  is  there  any  man  so  un- 
wise as  not  to  see,  that  (considering  what  has  nappened)  he 
will  suffer  no  law  to  be  made  here,  but  such  as  suits  hi* 
purpose  ?  We  may  be  as  effectually  enslaved  by  the  want 
of  laws  in  America,  as  by  submitting  to  laws  made  for  us  in 
England.  After  matters  are  made  up  (as  it  is  called)  can 
there  be  any  doubt,  but  the  whole  power  of  the  crown  will 
be  exerted,  to  keep  this  continent  as  low  and  humble  as  pos- 
sible ?  Instead  or  going  forward  we  shall  go  backward,  or 
be  perpetually  quarrelling,  or  ridiculously  petitioning. — We 
are  already  greater  than  the  king  wishes  us  to  be,  and  will 
he  not  hereafter  endeavor  to  make  us  less  ?  To  bring  the 
matter  to  one  point,  Is  the  power  who  is  jealous  of  our  pros- 
perity, a  proper  power  to  govern  us  ?  Whoever  says  JWo,  to 
this  question,  is  an  independent,  for  independency  means  no 
more  than  this,  whether  we  shall  make  our  own  laws,  or, 
whether  the  king,  the  greatest  enemy  which  this  continent 
hath,  or  can  have,  shall  tell  us,  "  there  shatt  be  no  laws  but 
such  as  Ilike" 

But  the  Mug,  you  will  say,  has  a  negative  in  England  ; 
the  people  there  can  make  no  laws  without  his  consent.  In 
point  of  right  and  good  order,  it  is  something  very  ridiculous, 
that  a  youth  of  twenty-one  (which  hath  often  happened)  shall 
say  to  several  millions  of  people,  older  and  wiser  than  him- 
self, I  forbid  this  or  that  act  of  yours  to  be  law.  But  in  this 
place  I  decline  this  sort  of  reply,  though  I  will  never  cease 
to  expose  the  absurdity  of  it ;  and  only  answer,  that  England 
being  the  king's  residence,  and  America  not,  makes  quite 
another  case.  The  king's  negative  here  is  ten  times  more 


30  COMMON   SENSE. 

dangerons  and  fatal  than  it  can  be  in  England ;  for  there 
he  will  scarcely  refuse  his  consent  to  a  bill  for  putting 
England  into  as  strong  a  state  of  defence  as  possible, 
and  in  America  he  would  never  suffer  such  a  bill  to  be 
passed. 

America  is  only  a  secondary  object  in  the  system  of  Brit- 
ish politics — England  consults  the  good  of  this  country  no 
further  than  it  answers  her  own  purpose.  Wherefore,  her 
own  interest  leads  her  to  suppress  the  growth  of  ours  in 
every  case  which  doth  not  promote  her  advantage,  or  in  the 
least  interferes  with  it.  A  pretty  state  we  should  soon  be  in 
under  a  second-hand  government,  considering  what  has  hap- 
pened !  Men  do  not  change  from  enemies  to  friends,  by  the 
alteration  of  a  name ;  and  in  order  to  show  that  reconcilia- 
tion now  is  a  dangerous  doctrine,  I  affirm,  that  it  would  be 
policy  in  the  king  at  this  time,  to  repeal  the  acts,  for  the  sake 
of  reinstating  himself  in  the  government  of  the  provinces  ;  in 
order  that  he  may  accomplish  by  craft  and  subtlety,  in  the 
long  run,  what  he  cannot  do  by  force  in  the  short  one.  Eecon 
ciliation  and  ruin  are  nearly  related. 

2dly,  That  as  even  the  best  terms,  which  we  can  expect  to 
obtain,  can  amount  to  no  more  than  a  temporary  expedient, 
or  a  land  of  government  by  guardianship,  which  can  last 
no  longer  than  till  the  colonies  come  of  age,  so  the  general 
face  and  state  of  things,  in  the  interim,  will  be  unsettled 
and  unpromising.  Emigrants  of  property  will  not  choose 
to  come  to  a  country  whose  form  of  government  hangs  but 
by  a  thread,  and  which  is  every  day  tottering  on  the  orink 
of  commotion  and  disturbance ;  and  numbers  of  the  present 
inhabitants  would  lay  hold  of  the  interval,  to  disDOse  of  their 
effects,  and  quit  the  continent. 

But  the  most  powerful  of  all  arguments,  is,  that  nothing 
but  independence,  i.  e.  a  continental  form  of  government, 
can  keep  the  peace  of  the  continent  and  preserve  it  inviolate 
from  civil  wars.  I  dread  the  event  of  a  reconciliation  with 
Britain  now,  as  it  is  more  than  probable  that  it  will  be  fol- 
lowed by  a  revolt  somewhere  or  other,  the  consequences  of 
which  may  be  far  more  fatal  than  all  the  malice  of  Bri- 
tain. 

Thousands  are  aiready  ruined  by  British  barbarity. 
(Thousands  more  will  probably  suffer  the  same  fate.)  Those 
men  have  other  feelings  than  us  who  have  nothing  suffered. 
All  they  now  possess  is  liberty,  what  they  before  enjoyed  is 
sacrificed  to  its  service,  and  having  nothing  more  to  lose, 


COMMON   SENSE.  31 

• 

they  disdain  submission.  Besides,  the  general  temper  of 
the  colonies,  towards  a  British  government,  will  be  like  that 
of  a  youth,  who  is  nearly  out  of  his  time ;  they  will  care 
very  little  about  her.  And  a  government  which  cannot 
preserve  the  peace,  is  no  government  at  all,  and  in  that  case 
we  pay  our  money  for  nothing ;  and  pray  what  is  it  that 
Britain  can  do,  whose  power  will  be  wholly  on  paper,  should 
a  civil  tumult  break  out  the  very  day  after  reconciliation  ? 
I  have  heard  some  men  say,  many  of  whom  I  believe  spoke 
without  thinking,  that  they  dreaded  an  independence,  fear- 
ing that  it  would  produce  civil  wars.  It  is  but  seldom  that 
our  first  thoughts  are  truly  correct,  and  that  is  the  case  here ; 
for  there  is  ten  times  more  to  dread  from  a  patched  up  con- 
aexion  than  from  independence.  I  make  the  sufferer's  case 
my  own,  and  I  protest,  that  were  I  driven  from  house  and 
home,  my  property  destroyed,  and  my  circumstances  ruined, 
that  as  a  man,  sensible  of  injuries,  I  could  never  relish  the 
doctrine  of  reconciliation,  or  consider  myself  bound 
thereby. 

The  colonies  have  manifested  such  a  spirit  of  good  order 
and  obedience  to  continental  government,  as  is  sufficient  to 
make  every  reasonable  person  easy  and  happy  on  that  head. 
No  man  can  assign  the  least  pretence  for  ms  fears,  on  any 
other  grounds,  than  such  as  are  truly  childish  and  ridicu- 
lous, wz.  that  one  colony  will  be  striving  for  superiority  over 
another. 

Where  there  are  no  distinctions  there  can  be  no  superi- 
ority ;  perfect  equality  affords  no  temptation.  The  repub- 
lics of  Europe  are  all  (and  we  may  say  always)  in  peace. 
Holland  and  Switzerland  are  without  wars,  foreign  or  do- 
mestic ;  monarchical  governments,  it  is  true,  are  never  lone 
at  rest :  the  crown  itself  is  a  temptation  to  enterprising  ruf- 
fians at  home ;  and  that  degree  of  pride  and  insolence  ever 
attendant  on  regal  authority,  swells  into  a  rupture  with 
foreign  powers,  in  instances  where  a  republican  government, 
by  being  formed  on  more  natural  principles,  would  negotiate 
tne  mistake. 

If  there  is  any  true  cause  of  fear  respecting  independence, 
it  is  because  no  plan  is  yet  laid  down.  Men  do  not  see  their 
way  out,  wherefore,  as  an  opening  into  that  business,  I  offer 
the  following  hints ;  at  the  sa  le  time  modestly  affirming, 
that  I  have  no  other  opinion  o1  them  myself,  than  that  they 
may  be  the  means  of  giving  rii  $to  something  better.  Could 
the  straggling  thoughts  of  ir  tividuals  be  collected,  they 


$2  COMMON   BEN8X. 

would  frequently  form  materials  for  wise  and  able  men  to 
improve  into  useful  matter. 

Let  the  assemblies  be  annual,  with  a  president  only.  The 
representation  more  equal.  Their  business  wholly  do- 
mestic, and  subject  to  the  authority  of  a  continental  con- 
gress. 

Let  each  colony  be  divided  into  six,  eight,  or  ten,  con- 
venient districts,  each  district  to  send  a  proper  number  of 
delegates  to  congress,  so  that  each  colony  send  at  least  thirty. 
The  whole  number  in  Congress  will  be  at  least  three  hun- 
dred and  ninety.  Each  congress  to  sit and  to 

choose  a  president  by  the  following  method.  When  the  de- 
legates are  met,  let  a  colony  be  taken  from  the  whole  thir- 
teen colonies  by  lot,  after  which,  let  the  congress  choose  (by 
ballot)  a  president  from  out  of  the  delegates  of  that  pro- 
vince. In  the  next  congress,  let  a  colony  be  taken  by  lot 
from  twelve  only,  omitting  that  colony  from  which  the  pre- 
sident was  taken  in  the  former  congress,  and  so  proceeding 
on  till  the  whole  thirteen  shall  have  had  their  proper  rotation. 
Ajad  in  order  that  nothing  may  pass  into  a  law  but  w";at  is 
satisfactorily  just,  not  less  than  three-fifths  of  the  Congress 
to  be  called  a  majority.  He  that  will  promote  discord,  un- 
der a  government  so  equally  formed  as  this,  would  have 
joined  Lucifer  in  his  revolt. 

But  as  there  is  a  peculiar  delicacy,  from  whom,  or  in  what 
manner  this  business  must  first  arise,  and  as  it  seems  most 
agreeable  and  consistent,  that  it  should  come  from  some  in- 
termediate body  between  the  governed  and  the  governors, 
that  is,  between  the  congress  and  the  people,  let  a  Conti- 
nental Conference  "be  held,  in  the  following  manner,  and  for 
the  following  purpose, 

A  committee  of  twenty-six  members  of  congress,  viz.  two 
for  each  colony.  Two  members  from  each  house  of  assem- 
bly, or  provincial  convention ;  and  five  representatives  of 
the  people  at  large,  to  be  chosen  in  the  capital  city  or  town 
of  each  province,  for,  and  in  behalf  of  the  whole  province, 
by  as  many  qualified  voters  as  shall  think  proper  to  attend 
from  all  parts  of  the  province  for  that  purpose  ;  or,  if  more 
convenient,  the  representatives  may  be  chosen  in  two  or 
three  of  the  most  populous  parts  thereof.  In  this  conference, 
thus  assembled,  will  be  united,  the  two  grand  principles  of 
business,  knowledge  and  power.  The  members  of  congress, 
assemblies,  or  conventions,  by  having  had  experience  in  na- 
tional concerns,  will  be  able  and  useiul  counsellors,  and  the 


COMMON    SENSE.  38 

whole,  being  empowered  by  the  people,  will  have  a  truly 
legal  authority. 

The  conferring  members  being  met,  let  their  business  be 
to  frame  a  Continental  Charter,  or  Charter  of  the  United 
Colonies ;  (answering  to  what  is  called  the  Magna  Charta 
of  England)  fixing  the  number  and  manner  of  choosing 
members  of  Congress,  and  members  of  assembly,  with  their 
date  of  sitting,  and  drawing  the  line  of  business  and  juris- 
diction between  them  :  (always  remembering,  that  our 
strength  is  continental,  not  provincial)  securing  freedom  and 
property  to  all  men,  and  above  all  tilings,  the  free  exercise 
of  religion,  according  to  the  dictates  01  conscience ;  with 
such  other  matter  as  it  is  necessary  for  a  charter  to  contain. 
Immediately  after  which,  the  said  conference  to  dissolve, 
and  the  bodies  which  shall  be  chosen  conformable  to  the 
said  charter,  to  be  the  legislators  and  governors  of  this  con- 
tinent for  the  time  being :  whose  peace  and  happiness,  may 
God  preserve,  Amen. 

Should  any  body  of  men  be  hereafter  delegated  for  this 
or  some  similar  purpose,  I  offer  them  the  following  extracts 
from  that  wise  observer  on  governments,  Dragonetti.  "  The 
science,"  says  he,  "  of  the  politician  consists  in  fixing  the 
true  point  of  happiness  and  freedom.  Those  men  would 
deserve  the  gratitude  of  ages,  who  should  discover  a  mode 
of  government  that  contained  the  greatest  sum  of  individual 
Happiness,  with  the  least  national  expense." 

But  where,  say  some,  is  the  king  of  America  ?  I'll  tell 
you,  friend,  he  reigns  above,  and  doth  not  make  havoc  of 
mankind  like  the  royal  brute  of  Britain.  Yet  that  we  may 
not  appear  to  be  defective  even  in  earthly  honors,  let  a  day 
be  solemnly  set  apart  for  proclaiming  the  charter ;  let  it  be 
brought  forth  placed  on  the  divine  law,  the  word  of  God  ; 
let  a  crown  be  placed  thereon,  by  which  the  world  may 
know,  that  so  mr  as  we  approve  of  monarchy,  that  in 
America  the  law  is  king.  For  as  in  absolute  governments 
the  king  is  law,  so  in  free  countries  the  law  ought  to  be 
king  ;  and  there  ought  to  be  no  other.  But  lest  any  ill  use 
should  afterwards  arise,  let  the  crown  at  the  conclusion  of 
the  ceromony  be  demolished,  and  scattered  among  the  people 
whose  right  it  is. 

A  government  of  our  own  is  our  natural  right :  and  when 
a  man  seriously  reflects  on  the  precariousness  of  human 
affairs,  he  will  become  convinced,  that  it  is  infinitely  wiser 
and  safer,  to  form  a  constitution  of  our  own  in  a  cool  deli- 


84  COMMON    SENSE. 

berate  manner,  while  we  have  it  in  our  power,  than  to  trust 
such  an  interesting  event  to  time  and  chance.  If  we  omit  it 
now,  some  Massanello*  may  hereafter  arise,  who,  laying 
hold  of  popular  disquietudes,  may  collect  together  the  des- 
perate and  the  discontented,  and  by  assuming  to  themselves 
the  powers  of  government,  finally  sweep  away  the  liberties 
of  the  continent  like  a  deluge.  Should  the  government  of 
America  return  again  into  the  hands  of  Britain,  the  totter- 
ing situation  of  things  will  be  a  temptation  for  some  desper- 
ate adventurer  to  try  his  fortune ;  and  in  such  a  case,  what 
relief  can  Britain  give  ?  Ere  she  could  hear  the  news,  the 
fatal  business  might  be  done ;  and  ourselves  suffering  like 
the  wretched  Britons  under  the  oppression  of  the  Conqueror. 
Ye  that  oppose  independence  now,  ye  know  not  what  ye  do ; 
ye  are  opening  a  door  to  eternal  tyranny,  by  keeping  vacant 
the  seat  of  government.  There  are  thousands  and  tens  of 
thousands,  who  would  think  it  glorious  to  expel  from  the 
continent,  that  barbarous  and  hellish  power,  which  hath 
stirred  up  the  Indians  and  negroes  to  destroy  us — the 
cruelty  hath  a  double  guilt,  it  is  dealing  brutally  by  us,  and 
treacherously  by  them. 

To  talk  of  friendship  with  those  in  whom  our  reason  for- 
bids us  to  have  faith,  and  our  affections,  wounded  through  a 
thousand  pores,  instruct  us  to  detest,  is  madness  and  folly. 
Every  day  wears  out  the  little  remains  of  kindred  between 
us  and  them ;  and  can  there  be  any  reason  to  hope,  that  as 
the  relationship  expires,  the  affection  will  increase,  or  that 
we  shall  agree  better  when  we  have  ten  times  more  and 
greater  concerns  to  quarrel  over  than  ever  ? 

Ye  that  tell  us  of  harmony  and  reconciliation,  can  ye  re- 
store to  us  the  time  that  is  past  ?  Can  ye  give  to  prostitu- 
tion its  former  innocence  ?  Neither  can  ye  reconcile  Britain 
and  America.  The  last  cord  now  is  broken,  the  people  of 
England  are  presenting  addresses  against  us.  There  are  in- 
juries which  nature  cannot  forgive ;  she  would  cease  to  be 
nature  if  she  did.  As  well  can  the  lover  forgive  the  ravisher 
of  his  mistress,  as  the  continent  forgive  the  murders  of  Bri- 
tain. The  Almighty  hath  implanted  within  us  these  unex- 
tinguishable  feelings,  for  good  and  wise  purposes.  They  are 
ihe  guardians  of  his  image  in  our  hearts,  and  distinguish  us 

*  Thomas  Anello,  otherwise  Massanello,  a  fisherman  of  Naples,  who  after 
spiriting-  up  his  countrymen  in  the  public  market  place,  against  the  oppression 
of  the  Spaniards,  to  whom  the  place  \vas  then  subject,  prompted  them  to 
revolt,  and  in  the  space  of  a  day  became  king, 


COMMON   SENSE.  85 

from  the  herd  of  common  animals.  The  social  compact 
would  dissolve,  and  justice  be  extirpated  from  the  earth,  or 
have  only  a  casual  existence  were  we  callous  to  the  touches 
of  affection.  The  robber,  and  the  murderer,  would  often 
escape  unpunished,  did  not  the  injuries  which  our  tempers 
sustain,  provoke  us  into  justice. 

O  I  ye  that  love  mankind  !  Ye  that  dare  oppose,  not  only 
the  tyranny,  but  the  tyrant,  stand  forth !  Every  spot  of  the 
old  world  is  overrun  with  oppression.  Freedom  hath  been 
hunted  round  the  globe.  Asia,  and  Africa,  have  long  ex- 
pelled her.  Europe  regards  her  like  a  stranger,  and  England 
hath  given  her  warning  to  depart.  0 1  receive  the  fugitive, 
and  prepare  in  time  an  asylum  for  mankind. 


ON  THE  PRESENT  ABILITY  OP  AMERICA. 

WITH  80MB  MISCELLANEOUS  REFLECTIONS. 

I  HAVE  never  met  with  a  man,  either  in  England  or  Arnei 
tea,  who  hath  not  confessed  his  opinion,  that  a  separation 
between  the  countries  would  take  place  one  time  or  other ; 
and  there  is  no  instance,  in  which  we  have  shown  less  judg- 
ment, than  in  endeavoring  to  describe,  what  we  can,  the 
ripeness  or  fitness  of  the  continent  for  independence. 

As  all  men  allow  the  measure,  and  vary  only  in  their 
opinion  of  the  time,  let  us,  in  order  to  remove  mistakes,  take 
a  general  survey  of  things,  and  endeavor,  if  possible,  to  find 
out  the  very  time.  But  we  need  not  go  far,  the  inquiry 
ceases  at  once,  for,  the  time  hath  found  us.  The  general 
concurrence,  the  glorious  union  of  all  things  proves  the  fact. 

It  is  not  in  numbers,  but  in  unity,  that  our  great  strength 
lies ;  yet  our  present  numbers  are  sufficient  to  repel  the  force 
of  all  the  world.  The  continent  hath  at  this  time,  the  largest 
body  of  armed  and  disciplined  men  of  any  power  under 
heaven ;  and  is  just  arrived  at  that  pitch  of  strength,  in 
which,  no  single  colony  is  able  to  support  itself,  and  the 
whole,  when  united,  can  accomplish  the  matter,  and  either 
more,  or  less  than  this,  might  be  fatal  in  its  effects.  Our 


£6  COMMON    SENSE. 

land  force  is  already  sufficient,  and  as  to  naval  affairs,  we 
cannot  be  insensible  that  Britain  would  never  suffer  an 
American  man  of  war  to  be  built  while  the  continent  re- 
mained in  her  hands.  Wherefore,  we  should  be  no  forwarder 
an  hundred  years  hence  in  that  branch,  than  we  are  now ; 
but  the  truth  is,  we  should  be  less  so,  because  the  timber  of 
the  country  is  every  day  diminishing,  and  that  which  will 
remain  at  last,  will  be  far  off  or  difficult  to  procure. 

Were  the  continent  crowded  with  inhabitants,  her  suffer- 
ings under  the  present  circumstances  would  be  intolerable. 
The  more  seaport-towns  we  had,  the  more  should  we  have 
both  to  defend  and  to  lose.  Our  present  numbers  are  so 
happily  proportioned  to  our  wants,  that  no  man  need  be 
idle.  The  diminution  of  trade  affords  an  army,  and  the  ne- 
cessities of  an  army  create  a  new  trade.  Debts  we  have 
none :  and  whatever  we  may  contract  on  this  account  will 
serve  as  a  glorious  memento  of  our  virtue.  Can  we  but 
leave  posterity  with  a  settled  form  of  government,  an  inde- 
pendent constitution  of  its  own,  the  purchase  at  any  price 
will  be  cheap.  But  to  expend  millions  for  the  sake  of  get- 
ting a  few  vile  acts  repealed,  and  routing  the  present  minis- 
try only,  is  unworthy  the  charge,  and  is  using  posterity  with 
the  utmost  cruelty;  because  it  is  leaving  them  the  great 
work  to  do,  and  a  debt  upon  their  backs,  from  which  they 
derive  no  advantage.  Such  a  thought  is  unworthy  a  man 
of  honor,  and  is  the  true  characteristic  of  a  narrow  heart  and 
a  peddling  politician. 

The  debt  we  may  contract  doth  not  deserve  our  regard,  if 
the  work  be  but  accomplished.  No  nation  ought  to  be 
without  a  debt.  A  national  debt  is  a  national  bond ;  and 
when  it  bears  no  interest,  is  in  no  case  a  grievance.  Britain 
is  oppressed  with  a  debt  of  upwards  of  one  hundred  and 
forty  millions  sterling,  for  which  she  pays  upwards  of  four 
millions  interest.  And  as  a  compensation  for  her  debt,  she 
has  a  large  navy ;  America  is  without  a  debt,  and  without  a 
navy ;  yet  for  the  twentieth  part  of  the  English  national 
debt,  could  have  a  navy  as  large  again.  The  navy  of  Eng- 
land is  not  worth,  at  this  time,  more  than  three  million  and 
a  half  sterling. 

The  following  calculations  are  given  as  a  proof  that  the 
above  estimation  of  the  navy  is  a  just  one.     [See 
Na/ocH  History,  Intro,  p.  56.] 


COMMON    SENSE. 


37 


fte  charge  of  building  a  ship  of  each  rate,  and  furnishing  her  with  masts, 
yards,  sails,  and  rigging,  together  with  a  proportion  of  eight  months  boat- 
swain's  and  carpenter's  sea-stores,  as  calculated  by  Mr.  Burchett,  secretary 
to  the  navy. 


For  a  ship  of  100  guns, 
90 
80 
70 
60 
60 
40 
SO 
•0 


85,553/. 

29,886 

23,638 

17,785 

14,197 

10,606 

7,558 

6,846 

8,710 


hence  it  is  easy  to  sum  up  the  value,  or  cost,  rather, 
of  the  whole  British  navy,  which,  in  the  year  1757,  when  it 
was  at  its  greatest  glory,  consisted  of  the  following  ships 
guns. 


Ships.             Gfvns.          Cost  of  ons.            Cost  of  all. 

6 

100 

65,553*. 

218-8  18/. 

12 

90 

29,886 

358,632 

12 

80 

23,688 

283,656 

43 

70 

17,786 

704,755 

85 

60 

14,197 

496,896 

40 

50 

10,605 

424,240 

45 

40 

7,558 

840,110 

58 

20 

8,710 

215,180 

'85  Sloops,  bombs,  and  ) 

fireships,  one  with  t    2,000                 170,000 

Cost,                 8,266,786/. 

.        Remains  for  guns,         233,214 

Total,          8,500,OOOZ. 

No  country  on  the  globe  is  so  happily  situated,  or  so 
internally  capable  of  raising  a  fleet  as  America.  Tar, 
timber,  iron  and  cordage  are  her  natural  produce.  We 
need  go  abroad  for  nothing.  Whereas,  the  Dutch,  who  make 
large  profits  by  hiring  out  their  ships  of  war  to  the  Span- 
iards and  Portuguese,  are  obliged  to  import  most  of  the 
materials  they  use.  We  ought  to  view  the  building  of  a 
fleet  as  an  article  of  commerce,  it  being  the  natural  manu- 
facture of  this  country.  It  is  the  best  money  we  can  lay  out. 
A  navy  when  finished  is  worth  more  than  it  cost:  and  is 
that  nice  point  in  national  policy,  in  which  commerce  and 
protection  are  united.  Let  us  build;  if  we  want  them 
not,  we  can  sell ;  and  by  that  means  replace  our  paper 
rency  with  ready  gold  and  silver. 


38  COMMON 

r 

In  point  of  manning  a  fleet,  people  in  general  run  into 
great  errors ;  it  is  not  necessary  that  one-fourth  part  should  be 
Bailors.  The  privateer  Terrible,  Captain  Death,  stood  the 
hottest  engagement  of  any  ship  last  war,  yet  had  not  twenty 
sailors  on  board,  though  her  complement  of  men  waa 
upwards  of  two  hundred.  A  few  able  and  social  sailors 
will  soon  instruct  a  sufficient  numier  of  active  landsmen  in 
the  common  work  of  a  ship.  Wherefore,  we  never  can  be 
more  capable  of  beginning  on  maritime  matters  than  now, 
while  our  timber  is  standing,  our  fisheries  blocked  up,  and 
our  sailors  and  shipwrights  out  of  employ.  Men  of  war, 
of  seventy  and  eighty  guns,  were  built  forty  years  ago  in 
]STew  England,  and  why  not  the  same  now  ?  Ship  building 
is  America's  greatest  pride,  and  in  which  she  will,  in  time, 
excel  the  whole  world.  The  great  empires  of  the  east  are 
mostly  inland,  and  consequently  excluded  from  the  possi- 
bility of  rivalling  her.  Africa  is  in  a  state  of  barbarism ; 
and  no  power  in  Europe,  hath  either  such  an  extent  of  coast, 
or  such  an  internal  supply  of  materials.  Where  nature  hath 
given  the  one,  she  hath  withheld  the  other ;  to  America  only 
hath  she  been  liberal  of  both.  The  vast  empire  of  Russia 
is  almost  shut  out  from  the  sea ;  wherefore,  her  boundless 
forests,  her  tar,  iron,  and  cordage  are  only  articles  of 
commerce. 

In  point  of  safety,  ought  we  to  be  without  a  fleet  ?  We 
are  not  the  little  people  now,  which  we  were  sixty  years 
ago ;  at  that  time  we  might  have  trusted  our  property  in  the 
streets,  or  fields  rather ;  and  slept  securely  without  locks  or 
bolts  to  our  doors  or  windows.  The  case  is  now  altered,  and 
our  methods  of  defence  ought  to  improve  with  our  increase 
of  property.  A  common  pirate,  twelve  months  ago,  might 
have  come  up  the  Delaware,  and  laid  this  city  under  contri- 
bution for  what  sum  he  pleased  ;  and  the  same  might  have 
happened  to  other  places.  Nay,  any  daring  fellow,  ,u  a 
brig  of  fourteen  or  sixteen  guns,  might  have  robbed  the 
whole  continent,  and  carried  off  half  a  million  of  money. 
These  are  circumstances  which  demand  our  attention,  and 
point  out  the  necessity  of  naval  protection. 

Some  perhaps,  will  say,  that  after  we  have  made  it  up 
with  Britain,  she  will  protect  us.  Can  they  be  so  unwise  as 
to  mean,  that  she  will  keep  a  navy  in  our  harbors  for  that 
purpose  ?  Common  sense  will  tell  us,  that  the  power  which 
nath  endeavored  to  subdue  us,  is  of  all  others,  the  most  im- 
proper to  defend  us.  Conquest  may  be  effected  under  the 


COMMON   SENSE. 


pretence  of  friendship  ;  and  ourselves,  after  a  long  and  brave 
resistance,  be  at  last  cheated  into  slavery.  And  if  her  ships 
are  not  to  be  admitted  into  our  harbors,  I  would  ask,  how  is 
she  to  protect  us  ?  A  navy  three  or  four  thousand  miles  off 
can  be  of  little  use,  and  on  sudden  emergencies,  none  at  all. 
Wherefore,  if  we  must  hereafter  protect  ourselves,  why  not 
do  it  for  ourselves?  Why  do  it  for  another? 

The  English  list  of  ships  of  war,  is  long  and  formidable, 
but  not  a  tenth  part  of  tnem  are  at  any  one  time  fit  for  ser- 
vice, numbers  of  them  are  not  in  being  ;  yet  their  names  are 
pompously  continued  in  the  list,  if  only  a  plank  be  left  of 
the  snip  ;  and  not  a  fifth  part  of  such  as  are  fit  for  service, 
can  be  spared  on  any  one  station  at  one  time.  The  East 
and  West  Indies,  Mediterranean,  Africa,  and  other  parts  of 
the  world,  over  which  Britain  extends  her  claim,  make  large 
demands  upon  her  navy.  From  a  mixture  of  prejudice  and 
inattention,  we  have  contracted  a  false  notion  respecting  the 
navy  of  England,  and  have  talked  as  if  we  should  have  the 
whole  of  it  to  encounter  at  once,  and,  for  that  reason,  sup- 
posed we  must  have  one  as  large  ;  which  not  being  instantly 
practicable,  has  been  majie  use  of  by  a  set  of  disguised  to- 
ries  to  discourage  our  beginning  thereon.  Nothing  can  be 
further  from  truth  than  this;  for  if  America  had  only  a 
twentieth  part  of  the  naval  force  of  Britain,  she  would  be  by 
far  an  over-match  for  her  ;  because,  as  we  neither  have,  nor 
claim  any  foreign  dominion,  our  whole  force  would  be  em- 
ployed on  our  own  coast,  where  we  should,  in  the  long  run, 
have  two  to  one  the  advantage  of  those  who  had  three  or 
four  thousand  miles  to  sail  over,  before  they  could  attack 
us,  and  the  same  distance  to  return  in  order  to  refit  and  re- 
cruit. And  although  Britain,  by  her  fleet,  hath  a  check 
over  our  trade  to  Europe,  we  have  as  large  a  one  over  her 
trade  to  the  West  Indies,  which,  by  laying  in  the  neighbor 
hood  of  the  continent,  is  entirely  at  its  mercy. 

Some  method  might  be  fallen  on  to  keep  up  a  naval  force 
in  time  of  peace,  'f  we  should  not  judge  it  necessary  to  sup- 
port a  constan;  navy.  If,  premiums  were  to  be  given  to 
merchants,  to  build  and  employ  in  their  service,  ship* 
mounted  with  twenty,  thirty,  forty,  or  fifty  guns,  (the  pre- 
miums to  be  in  proportion  to  the  loss  of  bulk  to  the  mer- 
chants,) fifty  or  sixty  of  those  ships  with  a  few  guardships 
un  constant  duty,  would  keep  up  a  sufficient  navy,  and  that 
without  burdening  ourselves  with  the  evil  so  loudly  com- 
plained of  iu  England,  of  suffering  their  fleet  in  time  of 


40  COMMON   SENSE. 

f 

peace,  to  lie  rotting  in  the  docks.  To  unite  the  sinews  of 
commerce  and  defence  is  sound  policy;  for  when  our 
strength  and  our  riches  play  into  each  other's  hand,  we  need 
fear  no  external  enemy. 

In  almost  every  article  of  defence  we  abound.  Hemp 
flourishes  even  to  rankness,  so  that  we  need  not  want  cord- 
age. Our  iron  is  superior  to  that  of  other  countries.  Our 
small  arms  equal  to  any  in  the  world.  Cannon  we  can  cast 
at  pleasure.  Saltpetre  and  gunpowder  we  are  every  day 
producing.  Our  knowledge  is  hourly  improving.  Resolu- 
tion is  our  inherent  character,  and  courage  hath  neveryet 
forsaken  us.  "Wherefore,  what  is  it  that  we  want  ?  Why 
is  it  that  we  hesitate  ?  From  Britain  we  can  expect  nothing 
but  ruin.  If  she  is  once  admitted  to  the  government  of  Ame- 
rica again,  this  continent  will  not  be  worth  living  in.  Jea- 
lousies will  be  always  arising,  insurrections  will  be  con- 
stantly happening ;  and  who  will  go  forth  to  quell  them  ? 
"W  ho  will  venture  his  life  to  reduce  his  own  countrymen  to 
a  foreign  obedience?  The  difference  between  Pennsylvania 
and  Connecticut,  respecting  some  unlocated  lands,  shows 
the  insignificance  of  a  British  government,  and  fully  proves 
that  nothing  but  continental  authority  can  regulate  conti- 
nental matters. 

Another  reason  why  the  present  time  is  preferable  to  all 
others,  is,  that  the  fewer  our  numbers  are,  the  more  land 
there  is  yet  unoccupied,  which,  instead  of  being  lavished  by 
the  king  on  his  worthless  dependants,  may  be  hereafter  ap- 
plied, not  only  to  the  discharge  of  the  present  debt,  but  to 
the  constant  support  of  government.  No  nation  under 
heaven  hath  such  an  advantage  as  this. 

The  infant  state  of  the  colonies,  as  it  is  called,  so  far  from 
being  against,  is  an  argument  in  favor  of  independence.  "We 
are  sufficiently  numerous,  and  were  we  more  so  we  might 
be  less  united.  It  is  a  matter  worthy  of  observation,  that 
the  more  a  country  is  peopled,  the  smaller  their  armies  are. 
In  military  numbers,  the  ancients  far  exceeded  the  moderns : 
and  the  reason  is  evident,  for  trade  being  the  consequence 
of  population,  men  become  too  much  absorbed  thereby  to 
attend  to  any  thing  else.  Commerce  diminishes  the  spirit 
both  of  patriotism  and  military  defence.  And  history  suffi- 
ciently informs  us,  that  the  bravest  achievements  were 
always  accomplished  in  the  non-age  of  a  nation.  "With  the 
increase  of  commerce  England  hath  lost  its  spirit.  The  city 
of  London,  notwithstanding  its  numbers,  s ...  mite  to  con- 


COMMON   SENSE.  41 

•% 

timied  insults  with  the  patience  of  a  coward.  The  more 
men  have  to  lose,  the  less  willing  are  they  to  venture.  The 
rich  are  in  general  slaves  to  fear,  and  submit  to  courtly 
power  with  the  trembling  duplicity  of  a  spaniel 

Youth  is  the  seed-time  of  good  habits,  as  well  in  nations 
as  in  individuals.  It  might  be  difficult,  if  not  impossible,  to 
form  the  continent  into  one  government  half  a  century 
hence.  The  vast  variety  of  interests,  occasioned  by  an  in- 
crease of  trade  and  population,  would  create  confusion. 
Colony  would  be  against  colony.  Each  being  able,  might 
scorn  each  other's  assistance:  and  while  the  proud  and 
foolish  gloried  in  their  little  distinctions,  the  wise  would 
lament  that  the  union  had  not  been  formed  before.  Where- 
fore the  present  fo'weisthe  true  time  for  establishing  it.  The 
intimacy  which  is  contracted  in  infancy,  and  the  friendship 
which  is  formed  in  misfortune,  are,  of  all  others,  the  most 
lasting  and  unalterable.  Our  present  union  is  marked  with 
Doth  these  characters;  we  are  young,  and  we  have  been 
distressed  ;  but  our  concord  hath  withstood  our  troubles, 
and  fixes  a  memorable  era  for  posterity  to  glory  in. 

The  present  time,  likewise,  is  that  peculiar  time  which 
never  happens  to  a  nation  but  once,  vis.  the  time  of  forming 
itself  into  a  government.  Most  nations  have  let  slip  the 
opportunity,  and  by  that  means  have  been  compelled  to  re- 
ceive laws  from  their  conquerors,  instead  of  making  laws 
for  themselves.  First,  they  had  a  king,  and  then  a  form  of 
government ;  whereas  the  articles  or  charter  of  government, 
should  be  formed  first,  and  men  delegated  to  execute  them 
afterwards :  but  from  the  errors  of  other  nations,  let  us  learn 
wisdom,  and  lay  hold  of  the  present  opportunity — to  begin 
government  at  the  right  end. 

"When  William  the  Conqueror  subdued  England,  he  gave 
them  law  at  the  point  of  the  sword  ;  and,  until  we  consent 
that  the  seat  of  government  in  America  be  legally  and 
authoritatively  occupied,  we  shall  be  in  danger  of  naving  it 
filled  by  some  fortunate  ruffian,  who  may  treat  us  in  the . 
same  manner,  and  then,  where  will  be  our  freedom  ?  where 
our  property  ? 

As  to  religion,  I  hold  it  to  be  the  indispensable  duty  of  all 
governments  to  protect  all  conscientious  professors  thereof, 
and  I  know  of  no  other  business  which  government  hath  to 
do  therewith.  Let  a  man  throw  aside  that  narrowness  of 
soul,  that  selfishness  of  principle,  which  the  niggards  of  all 
professions  are  so  unwilling  to  part  with,  and  ne  will  be  at 


4:2  COMMON   SENSE. 

once  delivered  of  hi&  fears  on  that  head.  Suspicion  is  tha 
•ompanion  of  mean  souls,  and  the  bane  of  all  good  society. 
For  myself,  I  fully  and  conscientiously  believe,  that  it  is  the 
will  of  the  Almighty,  that  there  should  be  a  diversity  of  re- 
ligious opinions  among  us :  it  affords  a  larger  field  for  our 
O.vistian  kindness.  Were  we  all  of  one  way  of  thinking, 
o;i;-  religious  dispositions  would  want  matter  for  probation ; 
and  on  this  liberal  principle,  I  look  on  the  various  denomi- 
nations among  us,  to  be  like  children  of  the  same  family, 
differing  only  in  what  is  called  their  Christian  names. 

In  a  former  page,  I  threw  out  a  few  thoughts  on  the  pro- 
priety of  a  Continental  Charter  (for  I  only  presume  to  offer 
hints,  not  plans)  and  in  this  place,  I  take  the  liberty  of  re- 
mentioning  the  subject,  by  observing  that  a  charter  is  to  be 
understood  as  a  bond  of  solemn  obligation,  which  the  whole 
enters  into,  to  support  the  right  of  every  separate  part, 
whether  of  religion,  personal  freedom,  or  property.  A  firm 
bargain  and  a  right  reckoning  make  long  friends. 

I  have  heretofore  likewise  mentioned  the  necessity  of  a 
large  and  equal  representation;  and  there  is  no  political 
matter  which  more  deserves  our  attention.  A  small  num- 
ber of  electors,  or  a  small  number  of  representatives,  are 
equally  dangerous.  But  if  the  number  of  the  representa- 
tives be  not  only  small,  but  unequal,  the  danger  is  increased. 
As  an  instance  of  this,  I  mention  the  following :  when  the 
associators'  petition  was  before  the  house  of  assembly  of 
Pennsylvania,  twenty-eight  members  only  were  present ;  all 
the  Bucks  county  members,  being  eight,  voted  against  it. 
and  had  seven  of  the  Chester  members  done  the  same,  this 
whole  province  had  been  governed  by  two  counties  only ; 
and  this  danger  it  is  always  exposed  to.  The  unwarrantable 
stretch  likewise,  which  that  house  made  in  their  last  sitting, 
to  gain  an  undue  authority  over  the  delegates  of  this  pro- 
vince, ought  to  warn  the  people  at  large,  how  they  trust  power 
out  of  their  own  hands.  A  set  of  instructions  for  their  dele- 
gates were  put  together,  which  in  point  of  sense  and  busi- 
ne&s  would  have  dishonoured  a  school-boy,  and  after  being 
approved  by  a,  few,  a  very  few,  without  doors,  were  carried 
into  the  house,  and  there  passed  in  behalf  of  the  whole 
colony  ;  whereas,  did  the  whole  colony  know  with  what  iL 
will  that  house  had  entered  on  some  necessary  public  mea- 
sures, they  would  not  hesitate  a  moment  to  think  them 
unworthy  of  such  a  trust. 

Immediate  necessity  makes  many  things  convenient,  which 


COMMON    SENSE.  48 

if  continued  would  grow  into  oppressions.  Expedience  and 
right  are  different  things.  When  the  calamities  of  America 
required  a  consultation,  there  was  no  method  so  ready,  or  at 
that  time  so  proper,  as  to  appoint  persons  from  the  several 
houses  of  assembly  for  that  purpose ;  and  the  wisdom  with 
which  they  have  proceeded  hath  preserved  this  continent  from 
ruin.  But  as  it  is  more  than  probable  that  we  shall  never 
be  without  a  Congress,  every  well-wisher  to  good  order  must 
own,  that  the  mode  for  choosing  members  of  that  body, 
deserves  consideration.  And  I  put  it  as  a  question  to 
those,  who  make  a  study  of  mankind,  whether  representa- 
tion and  election  is  not  too  great  a  power  for  one  and  the 
same  body  of  men  to  possess  ?  Whenever  we  are  planning 
for  posterity,  we  ought  to  remember  that  virtue  is  not 
hereditary. 

It  is  from  our  enemies  that  we  often  gain  excellent  max- 
ims, and  are  frequently  surprised  into  reason  by  their 
mistakes.  Mr.  Cornwall  (one  of  the  lords  of  the  treasury) 
treated  the  petition  of  the  New- York  assembly  with  con- 
tempt, because  that  house,  he  said,  consisted  but  of  twenty- 
six  members,  which  trifling  number,  he  argued,  could  not 
with  decency  be  put  for  the  whole.  We  thank  him  for  his 
involuntary  honesty.* 

To  conclude.  However  strange  it  may  appear  to  some, 
or  however  unwilling  they  may  be  to  think  so,  matters  not, 
but  many  strong  and  striking  reasons  may  be  given,  to  show, 
that  nothing  can  settle  our  affairs  so  expeditiously  as  an 
open  and  determined  declaration  for  independence.  Some 
01  which  are, 

1st,  It  is  the  custom  of  nations,  when  any  two  are  at  war, 
for  some  other  powers,  not  engaged  in  the  quarrel,  to  step 
in  as  mediators,  and  bring  about  the  preliminaries  of  a 

Ejace;    but  while  America   calls   herself   the  subject  of 
ritain,  no  power,  however  well  disposed  she  may  be,  can 
offer  her  mediation.     Wherefore,  in  our  present  state,  we 
may  quarrel  on  for  ever. 

2d,  It  is  unreasonable  to  suppose,  that  France  or  Spain 
will  give  us  any  kind  of  assistance,  if  we  mean  only  to 
make  use  of  that  assistance  for  the  purpose  of  repairing  the 
breach  and  strengthening  the  connexion  between  Britain 
and  America ;  because,  those  powers  would  be  sufferers  by 
the  consequences. 

*  Those  who  would  fully  understand  of  what  great  consequence  a  large  and 
•qual  representation  is  to  a  state,  should  read  Burgh's  Political  Disquisitions. 


44  COMMON   SENSE. 

3d,  "While  we  profess  ourselves  the  subjects  of  Britain,  w» 
must,  in  the  eyes  of  foreign  nations,  be  considered  as  rebels. 
The  precedent  is  somewhat  dangerous  to  their  peace,  for  men 
to  be  in  arms  under  the  name  of  subjects ;  we,  on  the  spot, 
can  solve  the  paradox:  but  to  unite  resistance  and  subjec- 
tion, requires  an  idea  much  too  refined  for  common  under- 
standing. 

4th,  Should  a  manifesto  be  published,  and  despatched  to 
foreign  courts,  setting  forth  the  miseries  we  have  endured, 
and  the  peaceful  methods  which  we  have  ineffectually  used 
for  redress ;  declaring  at  the  same  time,  that  not  being  able, 
any  longer,  to  live  happily,  or  safely  under  the  cruel  dispo- 
sition of  the  British  court,  we  had  been  driven  to  the  neces- 
sity of  breaking  off  all  connexion  with  her;  at  the  same 
time,  assuring  all  such  courts  of  our  peaceable  disposition 
towards  them,  and  of  our  desire  of  entering  into  trade  with 
them.  Such  a  memorial  would  produce  more  good  effects 
to  this  continent,  than  if  a  ship  were  freighted  with  petitions 
to  Britain. 

Under  our  present  denomination  of  British  subjects,  we 
can  neither  be  received  nor  heard  abroad :  the  custom  of  ali 
courts  is  against  us,  and  will  be  so,  until,  by  an  independ- 
ence, we  take  rank  with  other  nations. 

These  proceedings  may  at  first  appear  strange  and  dim* 
cult ;  but  like  all  other  steps,  which  we  have  already  passed 
over,  will  in  a  little  time  become  familiar  and  agreeable ; 
and,  until  an  independence  is  declared,  the  continent  will 
feel  itself  like  a  man  who  continues  putting  off  some  unplea- 
sant business  from  day  to  day,  yet  knows  it  must  be  done, 
hates  to  set  about  it,  wishes  it  over,  and  is  continually 
haunted  with  the  thoughts  of  its  necessity. 


iPPENDIX. 


SINCE  the  publican  wm  of  the  first  edition  of  this  pamphlet, 
or  rather,  on  the  saint?  aay  on  which  it  came  out,  the  king's 
speech  made  its  appearance  in  this  city.  Had  the  spirit  of 
prophecy  directed  the  6irth  of  this  production,  it  could  not 
have  brought  it  forth  at  a  more  seasonable  juncture,  or  at  a 
more  necessary  time.  The  bloody-mindedness  of  the  one, 
shows  the  necessity  of  purbuing  the  doctrine  of  the  other. 
Men  read  by  way  of  revenge : — and  the  speech,  instead  of 
terrifying,  prepared  a  way  for  the  manly  principles  of  inde- 
pendence. 

Ceremony,  and  even  silence,  from  whatever  motives  they 
may  arise,  have  a  hurtful  tendency,  when  they  give  the 
least  degree  of  countenance  to  base  and  wicked  perform- 
ances ;  wherefore,  if  this  maxim  be  admitted,  it  naturally 
follows,  that  the  king's  speech,  as  being  a  piece  of  finished 
villany,  deserved  and  still  deserves,  a  general  execration, 
both  by  the  congress  and  the  people.  Y et,  as  the  domestic 
tranquillity  of  a  nation,  depends  greatly  on  the  chastity  of 
what  may  properly  be  called  national  manners,  it  .is  often 
better  to  pass  some  things  over  in  silent  disdain,  than  to 
make  use  of  such  new  methods  of  dislike,  as  might  introduce 
the  least  innovation  on  that  guardian  of  our  peace  and 
safety.  And,  perhaps,  it  is  chiefly  owing  to  this  prudent 
delicacv,  that  tne  king's  speech  hath  not  before  now  suffered 
a  public  execution.  The  speech,  if  it  may  be  called  one,  is 
nothing  better  than  a  wilful,  audacious  libel  against  the 
truth,  the  common  good,  and  the  existence  of  mankind ;  and 
is  a  formal  and  pompous  method  of  offering  up  human  sacri- 
^ces  to  the  pride  of  tyrants.  But  this  general  massacre  of 
mankind,  is  one  of  the  privileges  and  the  certain  conse- 
quences of  kings ;  for  as  nature  knows  them  not,  they  know 
not  her,  and  although  they  are  beings  of  our  own  creating, 


6  COMMON    SENSE. 

they  know  not  us,  and  are  become  the  gods  of  their  creators. 
The  speech  hath  one  good  quality,  winch  is,  that  it  is  not 
calculated  to  deceive,  neither  can  we,  if  we  would,  be  de- 
ceived by  it.  Brutality  and  tyranny  appear  on  the  face  of 
it.  It  leaves  us  at  no  loss ;  and  every  line  convinces,  even 
in  the  moment  of  reading,  that  he  who  hunts  the  woods  for 
prey,  the  naked  and  untutored  Indian,  is  less  savage  than 
the  king  of  Britain. 

Sir  John  Dalrymple,  the  putative  father  of  a  whining  Jesu- 
itical piece,  fallacious  called,  "  The  address  of  the  people  of 
England  to  the  inhabitants  of  America,"  hath  perhaps,  from 
a  vain  supposition  that  the  people  here  were  to  be  frightened 
at  the  pomp  and  description  of  a  king,  given  (though  very 
unwisely  on  his  part)  the  real  character  of  the  present  one : 
"  But,"  says  this  writer,  "  if  you  are  inclined  to  pay  compli- 
ments to  an  administration,  which  we  do  not  complain  of" 
(meaning  the  Marquis  of  Rockingham's  at  the  repeal  of  the 
Stamp  Act)  "  it  is  very  unfair  in  you  to  withhold  them  from 
that  prince,  by  whose  NOD  ALONE  they  were  permitted  to  do 
any  thing*  This  is  toryism  with  a  witness !  Here  is  idol- 
atry even  without  a  mask :  and  he  who  can  calmly  hear 
and  digest  such  doctrine,  hath  forfeited  his  claim  to  ration- 
ality ;  is  an  apostate  from  the  order  of  manhood,  and  ought 
to  be  considered — as  one,  who  hath  not  only  given  up  the 
proper  dignity  of  man,  but  sunk  himself  beneath  the  rank 
of  animals,  and  contemptibly  crawls  through  the  world  like 
a  worm. 

However,  it  matters  very  little  now,  what  the  king  of 
England  either  says  or  does;  he  hath  wickedly  broken 
through  every  moral  and  human  obligation,  trampled  nature 
and  conscience  beneath  his  feet ;  and  by  a  steady  and  con- 
stitutional spirit  of  insolence  and  cruelty,  procured  for  him- 
self an  universal  hatred.  It  is  now  the  interest  of  America 
to  provide  for  herself.  She  hath  already  a  large  and  young 
family,  whom  it  is  more  her  duty  to  take  care  of,  than  to  be 
granting  away  her  property  to  support  a  power  which  is  be- 
come a  reproach  to  the  names  of  men  and  Christians —  Ye, 
whose  office  it  is  to  watch  over  the  morals  of  a  nation,  of  what- 
soever sect  or  denomination  ye  are  of,  as  well  as  ye  who  are 
more  immediately  the  guardians  of  the  public  liberty,  if  you 
wish  to  preserve  your  native  country  uncontaminated  by 
European  corruption,  ye  must  in  secret  wish  a  separation — 
but  leaving  the  moral  part  to  private  reflection,  I  shall 
chiefly  confine  my  further  remarks  to  the  following  heads : 


COMMON    SENSE.  47 

1st,  That  it  is  the  interest  of  America  to  be  separated 
from  Britain. 

2d,  Which  is  the  easiest  and  most  practicable  plan,  recon- 
ciliation or  independence?  with  some  occasional  remarks. 

In  support  of  the  first,  I  could,  if  I  judged  it  proper, 
produce  the  opinion  of  some  of  the  ablest  and  most  ex- 
perienced men  on  this  continent :  and  whose  sentiments  on 
that  head,  are  not  yet  publicly  known.  It  is  in  reality  a  self- 
evident  position :  for  no  nation  in  a  state  of  foreign  depend- 
ence, limited  in  its  commerce,  and  cramped  and  fettered  in 
its  legislative  powers,  can  ever  arrive  at  any  material  emi- 
nence. America  doth  not  yet  know  what  opulence  is ;  and 
although  the  progress  which  she  hath  made  stands  unparal- 
leled in  the  history  of  other  nations,  it  is  but  childhood,  com- 
pared with  what  she  would  be  capable  of  arriving  at,  had 
she,  as  she  ought  to  have,  the  legislative  powers  in  her  own 
hands.  England  is,  at  this  time,  proudly  coveting  what 
would  do  her  no  good  were  she  to  accomplish  it ;  and  the 
continent  hesitating  on  a  matter  which  will  be  her  final  ruin 
if  neglected.  It  is  the  commerce  and  not  the  conquest  of 
America  by  which  England  is  to  be  benefited,  and  that 
would  in  a  .gfceac  measure  continue,  were  the  countries  as  in- 
dependent of  each  other  as  France  and  Spain ;  because  in 
many  articles  neither  can  go  to  a  better  market.  But  it  is 
the  independence  of  this  country  of  Britain,  or  any  other, 
which  is  now  the  main  and  only  object  worthy  of  conten- 
tion, and  which,  like  all  other  truths  discovered  by  neces- 
sity, will  appear  clearer  and  stronger  every  day. 

1st,  Because  it  will  come  to  that  one  time  or  other. 

2d,  Because  the  longer  it  is  delayed,  the  harder  it  will  be 
to  accomplish.  I  have  frequently  amused  myself  both  in 
public  and  private  companies,  with  silently  remarking  the 
specious  errors  of  those  who  speak  without  reflecting.  And 
among  the  many  which  I  have  heard,  the  following  seems 
the  most  general,  viz.  that  if  this  rupture  should  happen 
forty  or  fifty  years  hence,  instead  of  now,  the  continent 
would  be  more  able  to  shake  off  the  dependence.  To  which 
I  replv,  that  our  military  ability  at  this  time,  arises  from  the 
experience  gained  in  the  last  war,  and  which  in  forty  or  fifty 
years  time  would  be  totally  extinct.  The  continent  would 
not,  by  that  time,  have  a  general,  or  even  a  military  officer 
left ;  and  we,  or  those  who  may  succeed  us,  would  be  as 
ignorant  of  martial  matters  as  the  ancient  Indians :  and  this 
position,  closely  attended  to,  will  unanswerably  prove 


48  COMMON    SENSE. 

that  the  present  time  is  preferable  to  all  others.  The  argu- 
ment tarns  thns — at  the  conclusion  of  the  last  war,  we  had 
experience,  but  wanted  numbers ;  and  forty  or  fifty  years 
hence,  we  shall  have  numbers,  without  experience ;  where- 
fore, the  proper  point  of  time,  must  be  some  particular  point 
between  the  two  extremes,  in  which  a  sufficiency  of  the  for- 
mer remains,  and  a  proper  increase  of  the  latter  is  obtained : 
and  that  point  of  time  is  the  present  time. 

The  reader  will  pardon  this  digression,  as  it  does  not  pro- 
perly come  under  the  head  I  first  set  out  with,  and  to  which 
I  again  return  by  the  following  position,  viz. 

Should  affairs  be  patched  up  with  Britain,  and  she  remain 
the  governing  and  sovereign  power  of  America,  (which,  aa 
matters  are  now  circumstanced,  is  giving  up  the  point  en- 
tirely) we  shall  deprive  ourselves  of  trie  very  means  of  sink- 
ing the  debt  we  have  or  may  contract.  The  value  of  the 
back  lands,  which  some  of  the  provinces  are  clandestinely 
deprived  of,  by  the  unjust  extension  of  the  limits  of  Canada, 
valued  only  at  five  pounds  sterling  per  hundred  acres, 
amount  to  upwards  of  twenty-five  millions  Pennsylvania 
currency  ;  and  the  quit-rents  at  one  penny  sterling  per  acre, 
to  two  millions  yearly. 

It  is  by  the  sale  of  those  lands  that  the  debt  may  be  sunk, 
without  burden  to  any,  and  the  quit-rent  reserved  thereon, 
will  always  lessen,  and  in  time,  will  wholly  support  the 
yearly  expense  of  government.  It  matters  not  how  long  the 
debt  is  in  paying,  so  that  the  lands  when  sold  be  applied  to 
to  the  discharge  of  it,  and  for  the  execution  of  which,  the 
congress  for  the  time  being,  will  be  the  continental  trustees. 

I  proceed  now  to  the  second  head,  vis.  Which  is  the 
easiest  and  most  practicable  plan,  reconciliation  or  indep&n- 
dence  f .  with  some  occasional  remarks. 

He  who  takes  nature  for  his  goide,  is  not  easily  beaten 
out  of  his  argument,  and  on  that  ground,  I  answer  gene- 
rally— That  INDEPENDENCE  being  a  SINGLE  SIMPLE  LINE,  con- 
tained within  ourselves  /  and  reconciliation,  a  matter  exceed- 
ingly perplexed  and  complicated,  and  in  which  a  treacherous^ 
capricious  court  is  to  interfere,  gives  the  answer  without  a 
doubt. 

The  present  state  of  America  is  truly  alarming  to  every 
man  who  is  capable  of  reflection.  Without  law,  without 
government,  without  any  other  mode  of  power  than  what 
is  founded  on,  and  granted  by,  courtesy.  Held  together  by 
an  unexampled  occurrence  or  sentiment,  which  is  nevertha- 


COMMON    SENSE.  49 

lees  subject  to  change,  and  which  every  secret  enemy  is  en- 
deavoring to  dissolve.  Our  present  condition  is,  legislation 
without  law ;  wisdom  without  a  plan ;  a  constitution  without 
a  name ;  and.  what  is  strangely  astonishing,  perfect  indepen- 
dence contending  for  dependence.  The  instance  is  without 
a  precedent ;  the  case  never  existed  before ;  and,  who  can 
tell  what  may  be  the  event  ?  The  property  of  no  man  is 
secure  in  the  present  unbraced  system  of  things.  The  mind 
of  the  multitude  is  left  at  random,  and  seeing  no  fixed  object 
before  them,  they  pursue  such  as  fancy  or  opinion  presents. 
Nothing  is  criminal;  there  is  no  such  thing  as  treason; 
wherefore,  every  one  thinks  himself  at  liberty  to  act  as  he 
pleases.  The  tories  dared  not  have  assembled  offensively, 
Dad  they  known  that  their  lives,  by  that  act,  were  forfeited 
to  the  laws  of  the  state.  A  line  of  distinction  should  be 
drawn  between  English  soldiers  taken  in  battle,  and  inhabi- 
tants of  America  taken  in  arms.  The  first  are  prisoners, 
but  the  latter  traitors.  The  one  forfeits  his  liberty,  the  other 
his  head. 

Notwithstanding  our  wisdom,  there  is  a  visible  feebleness 
in  some  of  our  proceedings  which  gives  encouragement  to 
dissentions.  The  Continental  Belt  is  too  loosely  buckled. 
And  if  something  is  not  done  in  time,  it  will  be  too  late  to 
do  any  thing,  and  we  shall  fall  into  a  state,  in  which  neither 
Reconciliation  nor  Independence  will  be  practicable.  The 
king  and  his  worthless  adherents  are  got  at  their  old  game 
of  dividing  the  continent,  and  there  are  not  wanting  among 
TIS,  printers,  who  will  be  busy  in  spreading  specious  false- 
hoods. The  artful  and  hypocritical  letter  which  appeared  a 
few  months  ago  in  two  of  the  New  York  papers,  and  like- 
wise in  others,  is  an  evidence  that  there  are  men  who  want 
both  judgment  and  honesty. 

It  is  easy  getting  into  holes  and  corners  and  talking  of  r& 
conciliation :  but  do  such  men  seriously  consider  how  diffi- 
cult the  task  is,  and  how  dangerous  it  may  prove,  should 
the  continent  divide  thereon.  Do  they  take  within  their 
view,  all  the  various  orders  of  men  whose  situation  and  cir- 
cumstances, as  well  as  their  own,  are  to  be  considered  therein? 
Do  they  put  themselves  in  the  place  of  the  sufferer  whose 
all  is  already  gone,  and  of  the  soldier,  who  hath  quitted  all 
for  the  defence  of  his  country  ?  If  their  ill-judged  modera- 
tion be  suited  to  their  own  private  situations  only,  regardless 
of  others,  the  event  will  convince  them  that  "  they  are  reck- 
oning without  their  hoet." 


5U  COMMON    SENSE. 

Put  us,  say  some,  on  the  footing  we  were  in  the  year  1763 
to  which  I  answer,  the  request  is  not  now  in  the  power  of 
Britain  to  comply  with,  neither  will  she  propose  it ;  but  if  it 
were,  and  even  should  it  be  granted,  I  ask,  as  a  reasonable 
question,  by  what  means  is  such  a  corrupt  and  faithless 
court  to  be  kept  to  its  engagements?  Another  parliament, 
nay,  even  the  present,  may  hereafter  repeal  the  obligation, 
on  the  pretence  of  its  being  violently  obtained,  or  unwisely 
granted ;  and,  in  that  case,  where  is  our  redress  ?  No  going 
to  law  with  nations ;  cannon  are  the  barristers  of  crowns ; 
and  the  sword,  not  of  justice,  but  of  war,  decides  the  suit. 
To  be  on  the  footing  of  1763,  it  is  not  sufficient,  that  the 
laws  only^  be  put  in  the  same  state,  but,  that  our  circum- 
stances, likewise,  be  put  in  the  same  state ;  our  burnt  and 
destroyed  towns  repaired,  or  built  up,  our  private  losses 
made  good,  our  public  debts  (contracted  for  defence)  dis- 
charged ;  otherwise,  we  shall  be  millions  worse  than  we  were 
at  that  enviable  period.  Such  a  request,  had  it  been  com- 
plied with  a  year  ago,  would  have  won  the  heart  and  soul 
of  the  continent — but  now  it  is  too  late :  "  The  Kubicon  is 
passed." 

Besides,  the  taking  up  arms,  merely  to  enforce  the  repeal 
of  a  pecuniary  law,  seems  as  unwarrantable  by  the  divine 
law,  and  as  repugnant  to  human  feelings,  as  the  taking  up 
arms  to  enforce  obedience  thereto.  The  object,  on  either 
side,  doth  not  justify  the  means ;  for  the  lives  of  men  are 
too  valuable  to  be  cast  away  on  such  trifles.  It  is  the  vio- 
lence which  is  done  and  threatened  to  our  persons ;  the  de- 
struction of  our  property  by  an  armed  force ;  the  invasion 
of  our  country  by  fire  and  sword,  which  conscientiously 
qualifies  the  use  of  arms :  and  the  instant  in  which  such 
mode  of  defence  became  necessary,  all  subjection  to  Britain 
ought  to  have  ceased ;  and  the  independence  of  America 
should  have  been  considered  as  dating  its  era  from,  and  pub- 
ashed  by,  the  first  musket  that  was  jvred  against  her.  This 
line  is  a  line  of  consistency ;  neither  drawn  by  caprice,  nor 
extended  by  ambition ;  but  produced  by  a  chain  of  events, 
of  which  the  colonies  were  not  the  authors. 

I  shall  conclude  these  remarks,  with  the  following  timely 
and  well-intended  hints.  We  ought  to  reflect  that  there  are 
three  different  ways  by  which  an  independency  may  here- 
after be  effected  ;  and  that  one  of  those  three,  will,  one  day 
or  other,  be  the  fate  of  America,  viz.  By  the  legal  voice  of 
the  people  in  congress  ;  by  a  military  power  ;  or  by  a  mob  : 


COMMON    SENSE.  51 

it  uiay  not  always  happen  that  our  soldiers  are  citizens,  and 
the  multitude  a  body  of  reasonable  men  ;  virtue,  as  I  have 
already  remarked,  is  not  hereditary,  neither  is  it  perpetual. 
Should  an  independency  be  brought  about  by  the  first  of 
those  means,  we  have  every  opportunity  and  every  encour- 
agement before  us,  to  form  the  noblest,  purest  constitution 
on  the  face  of  the  earth.  We  have  it  in  our  power  to  begin 
the  world  over  again.  A  situation,  similar  to  the  present, 
hath  not  happened  since  the  days  of  Noah  until  now.  The 
birthday  of  a  new  world  is  at  hand,  and  a  race  of  men,  per- 
haps as  numerous  as  all  Europe  contains,  are  to  receive 
their  portion  of  freedom  from  the  events  of  a  few  months. 
The  reflection  is  awful — and  in  this  point  of  view,  how 
trifling,  how  ridiculous,  do  the  little  paltry  cavilings,  of  a  few 
weak  or  interested  men  appear,  when  weighed  against  the 
business  of  a  world. 

Should  we  neglect  the  present  favorable  and  inviting 
period,  and  independence  be  hereafter  effected  by  any  other 
means,  we  must  charge  the  consequence  to  ourselves,  or  to 
those  rather,  whose  narrow  and  prejudiced  souls,  are  habit- 
ually opposing  the  measure,  without  either  inquiring  or  re- 
flecting. There  are  reasons  to  be  giverf  in  support  of  inde- 
pendence, which  men  should  rather  privately  think  of,  than 
be  publicly  told  of.  "We  ought  not  now  to  be  debating 
whether  we  shall  be  independent  or  not,  but  anxious  to 
accomplish  it  on  a  firm,  secure,  and  honorable  basis,  and 
uneasy  rather,  that  it  is  not  yet  began  upon.  Every  day 
convinces  us  of  its  necessity.  Even  the  tories  (if  such  things 
yet  remain  among  us)  should,  of  all  men,  be  the  most  so- 
licitous to  promote  it ;  for  as  the  appointment  of  committees 
at  first,  protected  them  from  popular  rage,  so,  a»  wise  and 
well-established  form  of  government  will  be  the  only  means 
of  continuing  it  securely  to  them.  Wherefore,  if  they  have 
not  virtue  enough  to  be  Whigs,  they  ought  to  have  prudence 
enough  to  wish  for  independence. 

In  short,  independence  is  the  only  bond  that  tie  and  keep 
us  together.  We  shall  then  see  our  object,  and  our  ears 
\rill  be  legally  shut  against  the  schemes  of  an  intriguing,  as 
well  as  cruel,  enemy.  We  shall  then,  too,  be  on  a  proper 
footing  to  treat  with  Britain  ;  for  there  is  reason  to  conclude, 
that  the  pride  of  that  court  will  be  less  hurt  with  treating 
with  the  American  states  for  terms  of  peace,  than  with  those, 
whom  sho  denominates  "  rebellious  subjects,"  for  terms  of 
Accommodation.  It  is  our  delaying  it  mat  encourages  her 


52  COMMON   SENSE. 

to  hope  for  conquest,  and  our  backwardness  tends  only  to 
prolong  the  war.  As  we  have,  without  any  good  effect 
therefrom,  withheld  our  trade  to  obtain  a  redress  of  our 
grievances,  let  us  now  try  the  alternative,  by  independently 
redressing  them  ourselves,  and  then  offering  to  open  the 
trade.  The  mercantile  and  reasonable  part  of  England, 
will  be  still  with  us ;  because,  peace  with  trade,  is  prefer- 
able to  war,  without  it.  And  if  this  offer  be  not  accepted, 
other  courts  may  be  applied  to. 

On  these  grounds  I  rest  the  matter.  And  as  no  offer  hath 
yet  been  made  to  refute  the  doctrine  contained  in  the 
former  editions  of  this  pamphlet,  it  is  a  negative  proof,  that 
either  the  doctrine  cannot  be  refuted,  or,  that  the  party  in 
favor  of  it  are  too  numerous  to  be  opposed.  Wherefore, 
instead  of  gazing  at  each  other,  with  suspicious  or  doubtful 
curiosity,  let  each  of  us  hold  out  to  his  neighbor  the  hearty 
hand  of  friendship,  and  unite  in  drawing  a  line,  which,  like 
an  act  of  oblivion,  shall  bury  in  forgetfulness  every  former 
dissention.  Let  the  names  of  whig  and  tory  be  extinct ;  and 
let  none  other  be  heard  among  us,  than  those  of  a  good 
citizen  •  an  open  and  resolute  friend ;  and  a  virtuous  sup- 
porter Of  the  EIGHTS  of  MANKIND,  and  Of  the  FEEE  AND 
PENDENT  STATES  OF  AMTCRTflA.. 


THE  END  OF  COMMON   BBN8B. 


THE    CRISIS 


THE    CRISIS. 


NUMBEK  I. 

THESE  are  the  times  that  try  men's  souls.  The  summer 
soldier  and  the  sunshine  patriot  will,  in  this  crisis,  shrink 
from  the  service  of  his  country;  but  he  that  stands  it 
NOW,  deserves  the  love  and  thanks  of  man  and  woman. 
Tyranny,  like  hell,  is  not  easily  conquered ;  yet  we  have 
this  consolation  with  us,  that  the  harder  the  conflict,  the 
more  glorious  the  triumph.  What  we  obtain  too  cheap,  we 
esteem  too  lightly :  'tis  clearness  only  that  gives  every  thing 
its  value.  Heaven  knows  how  to  put  a  proper  price  upon 
its  goods ;  and  it  would  be  strange  indeed,  if  so  celestial  an 
article  as  FREEDOM  should  not  be  highly  rated.  Britain,  with 
an  army  to  enforce  her  tyranny,  has  declared  that  she  has  a 
right  (not  only  to  TAX)  but  "  to  BIND  us  in  ATT.  OASES  WHAT- 
SOEVER," and  if  being  bound  in  that  manner,  is  not  slavery, 
then  is  there  not  such  a  thing  as  slavery  upon  earth.  Even 
the  expression  is  impious,  for  so  unlimited  a  power  can  be- 
long only  to  God. 

Whether  the  independence  of  the  continent  was  declared 
too  soon,  or  delayed  too  long,  I  will  not  now  enter  into  as 
an  argument ;  my  own  simple  opinion  is,  that  had  it  been 
eight  months  earlier,  it  would  have  been  much  better.  We 
did  not  make  a  proper  use  of  last  winter,  neither  could  we, 
while  we  were  in  a  dependent  state.  However,  the  fault,  if 
it  were  one,  was  all  our  own ;  we  have  none  to  blame  but 
ourselves.  But  no  great  deal  is  lost  yet ;  all  that  Howe  has 
been  doin^  for  this  month  past,  is  rather  a  ravage  than  a  con- 
quest, which  the  spirit  of  the  Jerseys  a  year  ago  would  have 
quickly  repulsed,  and  which  time  and  a  little  resolution  will 
«oon  recover. 


THE   CRISIS. 


I  have  as  little  superstition  in  me  as  any  man  living,  but 
mv  secret  opinion  has  ever  been,  and  still  is,  that  God  Al- 
mighty will  not  give  up  a  people  to  military  destruction,  or 
leave  them  unsupported^  to  perish,  who  have  so  earnestly 
and  so  repeatedly  sought  to  avoid  the  calamities  of  war,  by 
every  decent  method  which  wisdom  could  invent.  Neither 
have  I  so  much  of  the  infidel  in  me,  as  to  suppose  that  He 
has  relinquished  the  government  of  the  world,  and  given  us 
up  to  the  care  of  devils ;  and  as  I  do  not,  I  cannot  see  on 
what  grounds  the  king  of  Britain  can  look  up  to  heaven  for 
help  against  us :  a  common  murderer,  a  highwayman,  or  a 
house-breaker,  has  as  good  a  pretence  as  he. 

"lis  surprising  to  see  how  rapidly  a  panic  will  sometimes 
run  through  a  country.  All  nations  and  ages  have  been 
subject  to  them:  Britain  has  trembled  like  an  ague  at  the 
report  of  a  French  fleet  of  flat-bottomed  boats  ;  and  in  the 
fourteenth  century  the  whole  English  army,  after  ravaging 
the  kingdom  of  France,  was  driven  back  like  men  petrified 
with  fear ;  and  this  brave  exploit  was  performed  by  a  few 
broken  forces  collected  and  neaded  by  a  woman,  Joan  of 
Arc.  Would  that  heaven  might  inspire  some  Jersey  maid 
to  spirit  up  her  countrymen,  and  save  her  fair  fellow  suffer- 
ers from  ravage  and  ravishment !  Yet  panics,  in  some 
cases,  have  their  uses ;  they  produce  as  much  good  as  hurt. 
Their  duration  is  always  short ;  the  mind  soon  grows  through 
them,  and  acquires  a  firmer  habit  than  before.  But  their 
peculiar  advantage  is,  that  they  are  the  touchstones  of  sin- 
cerity and  hypocrisy,  and  bring  things  and  men  to  light, 
which  might  otherwise  have  lain  forever  undiscovered.  In 
fact,  they  have  the  same  effect  on  secret  traitors,  which  an 
imaginary  apparition  would  have  upon  a  private  murderer. 
They  sift  out  the  hidden  thoughts  of  man,  and  hold  them 
up  in  public  to  the  world.  Many  a  disguised  tory  has  lately 
shown  his  head,  that  shall  penitentially  solemnize  witn 
curses  the  day  on  which  Howe  arrived  upon  the  Delaware. 

As  I  was  with  the  troops  at  Fort  Lee,  and  marched  with 
them  to  the  edge  of  Pennsylvania,  I  am  well  acquainted 
with  many  circumstances,  which  those  who  live  at  a  dis- 
tance, know  but  little  or  nothing  of.  Our  situation  there, 
was  exceedingly  cramped,  the  place  beinga  narrow  neck  of 
land  between  the  North  River  and  the  Hackensack.  Our 
force  was  inconsiderable,  being  not  one  fourth  so  great  as 
Howe  could  bring  against  us.  We  had  no  army  at  hand  to 
have  relieved  the  garrison,  had  we  shut  ourselves  up  and 


THE   CRISIS.  ft 

stood  on  our  defence.  Our  ammunition,  light  artillery,  and 
the  best  part  of  our  stores,  had  been  removed,  on  the  appre- 
hension that  Howe  would  endeavor  to  penetrate  the  Jerseys, 
in  which  case  fort  Lee  could  be  of  no  use  to  us ;  for  it  must 
occur  to  every  thinking  man,  whether  in  the  army  or  not, 
that  these  kind  of  field  forts  are  only  for  temporary  purposes, 
and  last  in  use  no  longer  than  the  enemy  directs  his  force 
against  the  particular  object,  which  such  forts  are  raised  to 
defend.  Such  was  our  situation  and  condition  at  fort  Lee  on 
the  morning  of  the  20th  of  November,  when  an  officer 
arrived  with  information  that  the  enemy  with  200  boats  had 
landed  about  seven  miles  above :  Major  General  Green,  who 
commanded  the  garrison,  immediately  ordered  them  under 
arms,  and  sent  express  to  General  Washington  at  the  town 
of  Hackensack,  distant  by  the  way  of  the  ferry,  six  miles. 
Our  first  object  was  to  secure  the  bridge  over  the  Hacken- 
sack, which  laid  up  the  river  between  the  enemy  and  us, 
about  six  miles  from  us,  and  three  from  them.  General 
Washington  arrived  in  about  three  quarters  of  an  hour,  and 
marched  at  the  head  of  the  troops  towards  the  bridge,  which 
place  I  expected  we  should  have  a  brush  for ;  however,  they 
did  not  choose  to  dispute  it  with  us,  and  the  greatest  part  of 
our  troops  went  over  the  bridge,  the  rest  over  the  ferry 
except  some  which  passed  at  a  mill  on  a  small  creek,  between 
the  bridge  and  the  ferry,  and  made  their  way  through  some 
marshy  grounds  up  to  the  town  of  Hackensack,  and  there 
passed  the  river.  We  brought  off  as  much  baggage  as  the 
wagons  could  contain,  the  rest  was  lost.  The  simple  object 
was  to  bring  off  the  garrison,  and  march  them  on  till  tney 
could  be  strengthened  by  the  Jersey  or  Pennsylvania  militia, 
so  as  to  be  enabled  to  make  a  stand.  "We  staid  four  days  at 
Newark,  collected  our  out-posts  with  some  of  the  Jersey 
militia,  and  marched  out  twice  to  meet  the  enemy,  on  being 
informed  that  they  were  advancing,  though  our  numbers 
were  greatly  inferior  to  theirs.  Howe,  in  my  little  opinion, 
committed  a  great  error  in  generalship  in  not  throwing  a 
body  of  forces  off  from  Staten  Island  through  Amboy,  by 
which  means  he  might  have  seized  all  our  stores  at  Bruns- 
wick, and  intercepted  our  march  into  Pennsylvania  :  but  if 
WQ  believe  the  power  of  hell  to  be  limited,  we  must  likewise 
believe  that  their  agents  are  under  some  providential  control. 
I  shall  not  now  attempt  to  give  all  the  particulars  of  our 
retreat  to  the  Delaware ;  suffice  for  the  present  to  say,  that 
both  officers  and  men,  though  greatly  harassed  and  fatigued, 


6  THE   CRISIS. 

without  rest,  covering,  or  provision,  the  inevitable  conse- 
quences of  a  long  retreat,  bore  it  with  a  manly  and  martial 
spirit.  All  their  wishes  centered  in  one,  which  was,  that  the 
country  would  turn  out  and  help  them  to  drive  the  enemy 
back.  Yoltaire  has  remarked  that  king  William  never 
appeared  to  full  advantage  but  in  difficulties  and  in  action ; 
the  same  remark  may  be  made  on  General  Washington,  for 
the  character  fits  him.  There  is  a  natural  firmness  in  some 
minds  which  cannot  be  unlocked  by  trifles,  but  which,  when 
unlocked,  discovers  a  cabinet  of  fortitude ;  and  I  reckon  it 
among  those  kind  of  public  blessings,  which  we  do  not 
immediately  see,  that  God  hath  blest  him  with  uninterrupted 
health,  and  given  him  a  mind  that  can  even  flourish  upon 
care. 

I  shall  conclude  this  paper  with  some  miscellaneous 
remarks  on  the  state  of  our  affairs ;  and  shall  begin  with 
asking  the  following  question,  Why  is  it  that  the  enemy 
have  left  the  New-England  provinces,  and  made  these  middle 
ones  the  seat  of  war!  The  answer  is  easy :  New-England 
is  not  infested  with  tories,  and  we  are.  I  have  been  tender 
in  raising  the  cry  against  these  men,  and  used  numberless 
arguments  to  show  them  their  danger,  but  it  will  not  do  to 
sacrifice  a  world  either  to  their  folly  or  their  baseness.  The 
period  is  now  arrived,  in  which  either  they  or  we  must 
change  our  sentiments,  or  one  or  both  must  fall.  And  what 
is  a  tory  ?  Good  God !  what  is  he  ?  I  should  not  be  afraid 
to  go  with  a  hundred  whigs  against  a  thousand  tories, 
were  they  to  attempt  to  get  into  arms.  Every  tory  is  a 
coward ;  for  servile,  slavish,  self-interested  fear  is  the  foun- 
dation of  toryism ;  and  a  man  under  such  influence,  though 
he  may  be  cruel,  never  can  be  brave. 

But,  before  the  line  of  irrecoverable  separation  be  drawn 
between  us,  let  us  reason  the  matter  together :  your  conduct 
is  an  invitation  to  the  enemy,  yet  not  one  in  a  thousand  of  you 
has  heart  enough  to  join  him.  Howe  is  as  much  deceived  by 
you  as  the  American  cause  is  injured  by  you.  He  expects 
you  will  all  take  up  arms,  and  flock  to  his  standard,  with 
muskets  on  your  shoulders.  Your  opinions  are  of  no  use  to 
him,  unless  you  support  him  personally,  for  'tis  soldiers,  and 
not  tories  that  he  wants. 

I  once  felt  all  that  kind  of  anger,  which  a  man  ought  to 
feel,  against  the  mean  principles  that  are  held  by  the  tories : 
a  noted  one,  who  kept  a  tavern  at  Amboy,  was  standing  at 
his  door,  with  as  pretty  a  child  in  his  hand,  about  eight  or 


THE   CRISIS.  7 

nine  years  old,  as  I  ever  saw,  and  after  speaking  his  mind 
as  freely  as  he  thought  was  prudent,  finished  with  this  un- 
fatherly  expression,  "  Well !  give  me  peace  in  my  day."  Not 
a  man  lives  on  the  continent  but  fully  believes  that  a  sepa 
ration  must  some  time  or  other  finally  take  place,  and  a 
generous  parent  should  have  said,  "  If  there  must  be  trouble, 
let  it  be  in  my  day,  that  my  child  may  have  peace  /  "  and 
this  single  reflection,  well  applied,  is  sufficient  to  awaken 
every  man  to  duty.  Not  a  place  upon  earth  might  be  so 
happy  as  America.  Her  situation  is  remote  from  all  the 
wrangling  world,  and  she  has  nothing  to  do  but  to  trade 
with  them.  A  man  can  distinguish  himself  between  temper 
and  principle,  and  I  am  as  confident,  as  I  am  that  God 
governs  the  world,  that  America  will  never  be  happy  till 
she  gets  clear  of  foreign  dominion.  "Wars,  without  ceasing, 
will  break  out  till  that  period  arrives,  and  the  continent 
must  in  the  end  be  conqueror ;  for  though  the  flame  of 
liberty  may  sometimes  cease  to  shine,  the  coal  can  never 
expire. 

America  did  not,  nor  does  not  want  force ;  but  she  wanted 
a  proper  application  of  that  force.  Wisdom  is  not  the  pur 
chase  of  a  day,  and  it  is  no  wonder  that  we  should  err  at 
the  first  setting  off.  From  an  excess  of  tenderness,  we 
were  unwilling  to  raise  an  army,  and  trusted  our  cause  to 
the  temporary  defence  of  a  well-meaning  militia.  A  sum- 
mer's experience  has  now  taught  us  better  ;  yet  with  those 
troops,  while  they  were  collected,  we  were  able  to  set 
bounds  to  the  progress  of  the  enemy,  and,  thank  God !  they 
are  again  assembling.  I  always  consider  militia  as  the 
best  troops  in  the  world  for  a  sudden  exertion,  bui  they  will 
not  do  for  a  long  campaign.  Howe,  it  is  probable,  will 
make  an  attempt  on  this  city  ;  should  he  fail  on  this  side  the 
Delaware,  he  is  ruined :  ii  he  succeeds,  our  cnuse  is  not 
ruined.  He  stakes  all  on  his  side  against  a  pai  t  on  ours  ; 
admitting  he  succeeds,  the  consequence  will  be,  that  armies 
from  both  ends  of  the  continent  will  march  tc  assist  their 
Buffering  Mends  in  the  middle  states ;  for  he  cannot  go 
every  where,  it  is  impossible.  I  consider  Howe  the  greatest 
enemy  the  tories  have ;  he  is  bringing  a  war  into  their 
country,  which,  had  it  not  been  for  him  and  partly  for 
themselves,  they  had  been  clear  of.  Should  he  now  be  ex- 
pelled, 1  wish  with  all  the  devotion  of  a  Christian,  that  the 
names  of  whig  and  tory  may  ne^er  more  be  mentioned ;  but 
should  the  tories  give  him  encouragement  to  come,  or  assist- 


8  THE   CRISIS. 

ance  if  he  come,  I  as  sincerely  wish  that  our  next  year's 
arms  may  expel  them  from  the  continent,  and  the  congress 
appropriate  their  possessions  to  the  relief  of  those  who  have 
suffered  in  well  doing.  A  single  successful  battle  next  year 
will  settle  the  whole.  America  could  carry  on  a  two  years' 
war  by  the  confiscation  of  the  property  of  disaffected  per- 
sons, and  be  made  happy  by  their  expulsion.  Say  not  that 
this  is  revenge,  call  it  rather  the  soft  resentment  of  a  suffer- 
ing people,  who,  having  no  object  in  view  but  the  good  of 
all,  have  staked  their  own  all  upon  a  seemingly  doubtful 
event.  Yet  it  is  folly  to  argue  against  determined  hardness ; 
eloquence  may  strike  the  ear,  and  the  language  of  sorrow 
draw  forth  the  tear  of  compassion,  but  nothing  can  reach  the 
heart  that  is  steeled  with  prejudice. 

Quitting  this  class  of  men,  I  turn  with  the  warm  ardor  of 
a  friend  to  those  who  have  nobly  stood,  and  are  yet  deter- 
mined to  stand  the  matter  out :  I  call  not  upon  a  few,  but  upon 
all :  not  on  this  state  or  that  state,  but  on  every  state ;  up  and 
help  us ;  lay  your  shoulders  to  the  wheel ;  better  have  too  much 
force  than  too  little,  when  so  great  an  object  is  at  stake.  Let 
it  be  told  to  the  future  world,  that  in  the  depth  of  winter, 
when  nothing  but  hope  and  virtue  could  survive,  that  the 
city  and  the  country,  alarmed  at  one  common  danger,  came 
forth  to  meet  and  to  repulse  it.  Say  not  that  thousands 
are  gone,  turn  out  your  tens  of  thousands ;  throw  not  the 
burden  of  the  day  upon  Providence,  but  "show  your 
faith  by  your  works"  that  God  may  bless  you.  It  matters 
not  where  you  live,  or  what  rank  of  life  you  hold,  the  evil 
or  the  blessing  will  reach  you  all.  The  far  and  the  near, 
the  home  counties  and  the  back,  the  rich  and  the  poor,  will 
suffer  or  rejoice  alike.  The  heart  that  feels  not  now,  is 
dead :  the  blood  of  his  children  will  curse  his  cowardice, 
who  shrinks  back  at  a  time  when  a  little  might  have  saved 
the  whole,  and  made  them  happy.  I  love  the  man  that  can 
smile  at  trouble,  that  can  gather  strength  from  distress,  and 
grow  brave  by  reflection.  "Us  the  business  of  little  minds 
to  shrink  ;  but  he  whose  heart  is  firm,  and  whose  conscience 
approves  his  conduct,  will  pursue  his  principles  unto  death, 
My  own  line  of  reasoning  is  to  myself  as  straight  and  clear 
as  a  ray  of  light.  ISTot  all  the  treasures  of  the  world,  so  far 
as  I  believe,  could  have  induced  me  to  support  an  offensive 
war,  for  I  think  it  murder ;  but  if  a  thief  breaks  into  my 
house,  bums  and  destroys  my  property,  and  kills  or  threatens 
to  kill  me,  or  those  that  are  in  it,  and  to  "  bind  me  in  all 


THE   CRISIS.  9 

eases  whatsoever?'  to  his  absolute  will,  am  I  to  suffer  itt 
What  signifies  it  to  me,  whether  he  who  does  it  is  a  king  or 
a  common  man ;  my  countryman,  or  not  my  countryman ; 
whether  it  be  done  by  an  individual  villain,  or  an  army  of 
them  ?  If  we  reason  to  the  root  of  things  we  shall  find  no 
difference ;  neither  can  any  just  cause  be  assigned  why  we 
should  punish  in  the  one  case  and  pardon  in  the  other. 
Let  them  call  me  rebel,  and  welcome,  I  feel  no  concern  from 
it ;  but  I  should  suffer  the  misery  of  devils,  where  I  to  make 
a  whore  of  my  soul  by  swearing  allegiance  to  one  whose 
character  is  that  of  a  sottish,  stupid,  stubborn,  worthless, 
brutish  man.  I  conceive  likewise  a  horrid  idea  in  receiving 
mercy  from  a  being,  who  at  the  last  day  shall  be  shrieking 
to  the  rocks  and  mountains  to  cover  him,  and  fleeing  with 
terror  from  the  orphan,  the  widow,  and  the  slain  of  America. 
There  are  cases  which  cannot  be  overdone  by  language, 
and  this  is  one.  There  are  persons  too  who  see  not  the  full 
extent  of  the  evil  which  threatens  them  ;  they  solace  them- 
selves with  hopes  that  the  enemy,  if  he  succeed,  will  be 
merciful.  Is  this  the  madness  of  folly,  to  expect  mercy  from 
those  who  have  refused  to  do  justice ;  and  even  mercy,  where 
conquest  is  the  object,  is  only  a  trick  of  war ;  the  cunning 
of  tne  fox  is  as  murderous  as  the  violence  of  the  wolf ;  and 
we  ought  to  guard  equally  against  both.  Howe's  first  ob- 
ject is  partly  by  threats  and  partly  by  promises,  to  terrify 
or  seduce  the  people  to  deliver  up  their  arms  and  to  receive 
mercy.  The  ministry  recommended  the  same  plan  to  Gage, 
and  this  is  what  the  tories  call  making  their  peace,  "a peace 

inTt.i 'f.Ji.  'nrump.f.J)  nil.  rn/ns?j>.<rstsi/nsl'j.'nsi  "  o/n./jji^/J.  t       A   TkAn.no  •wrhip'h 


which  passeth  all  understanding"  indeed  !  A  peace  which 
would  be  the  immediate  forerunner  of  a  worse  ruin  than 
any  we  have  yet  thought  of.  Ye  men  of  Pennsylvania,  do 
reason  upon  these  things  !  Were  the  back  counties  to  give 
up  their  arms,  they  would  fall  an  easy  prey  to  the  Indians, 
wno  are  all  armed  ;  this  perhaps  is  what  some  tories  would 
not  be  sorry  for.  Were  the  home  counties  to  deliver  up 
their  arms,  they  would  be  exposed  to  the  resentment  of  the 
back  counties,  who  would  then  have  it  in  their  power  to 
chastise  their  defection  at  pleasure.  And  were  any  one 
state  to  give  up  its  arms,  that  state  must  be  garrisoned  by 
Howe's  army  of  Britains  and  Hessians  to  preserve  it  from 
the  anger  or  the  rest.  Mutual  fear  is  the  principal  link  in 
the  chain  of  mutual  love,  and  wo  be  to  that  state  mat  breaks 
the  compact.  Howe  is  mercifully  inviting  you  to  bar- 
barous destruction,  and  men  must  be  either  rogues  or  fool  a 


10  THE   CRISIS. 

that  will  not  see  it.  I  dwell  not  upon  the  powers  of  iinagi 
nation ;  I  brin^  reason  to  your  ears ;  and  in  language  a& 
plain  as  A,  B,  C,  hold  up  truth  to  your  eyes. 

I  thank  God  that  I  fear  not.  I  see  no  real  cause  for  fear. 
I  know  our  situation  well,  and  can  see  the  way  out  of  it. 
While  our  army  was  collected,  Howe  dared  not  risk  a 
battle,  and  it  is  no  credit  to  him  that  he  decamped  from  the 
White  Plains,  and  waited  a  mean  opportunity  to  ravage  the 
defenceless  Jerseys  ;  but  it  is  great  credit  to  us,  that,  with  a 
handful  of  men,  we  sustained  an  orderly  retreat  for  near  an 
hundred  miles,  brought  off  our  ammunition,  all  our  field 
pieces,  the  greatest  part  of  our  stores,  and  had  four  rivers  to 
pass.  None  can  say  that  our  retreat  was  precipitate,  for  we 
were  near  three  weeks  in  performing  it,  that  the  country 
might  have  time  to  come  in.  Twice  we  marched  back  to 
meet  the  enemy,  and  remained  out  till  dark.  The  sign  of 
fear  was  not  seen  in  our  camp,  and  had  not  some  of  the 
cowardly  and  disaffected  inhabitants  spread  false  alarms 
through  the  country,  the  Jerseys  had  never  been  ravaged. 
Once  more  we  are  again  collected  and  collecting,  our  new 
army  at  both  ends  of  the  continent  is  recruiting  fast,  and 
we  shall  be  able  to  open  the  next  campaign  with  sixty 
thousand  men,  well  armed  and  clothed.  This  is  our  situa- 
tion, and  who  will  may  know  it.  By  perseverance  and 
fortitude  we  have  the  prospect  of  a  glorious  issue;  by 
cowardice  and  submission,  the  sad  choice  of  a  variety  of 
evils — a  ravaged  country — a  depopulated  city — habitations 
without  safety,  and  slavery  without  hope — our  homes  turned 
into  barracks  and  bawdy-houses  for  Hessians,  and  a  future 
race  to  provide  for,  whose  fathers  we  shall  doubt  of.  Look 
on  this  picture  and  weep  over  it !  and  if  there  yet  remains 
one  thoughtless  wretch  who  believes  it  not,  let  him  suffer  it 
unlamented.  COMMON  SENSE. 

December  23,  1YY6. 


KUMBEK    II. 

TO  LORD  HOWE. 

What's  in  the  name  of  lord  that  I  should  fear 
To  bring  my  grievance  to  the  public  ear  f  ' 

Churchill. 

UNIVERSAL  empire  is  the  prerogative  of  a  writer.     His 
concerns  are  with  all  mankind,  and  though  he  cannot  com- 


THE   CRISIS.  11 

their  obedience,  lie  can  assign  them  their  duty.  The 
Bermblic  of  Letters  is  more  ancient  than  monarchy,  and  of 
far  ni^her  character  in  the  world  than  the  vassal  court  of 
Britain ;  he  that  rebels  against  reason  is  a  real  rebel,  but  he 
that  1*1  defence  of  reason,  rebels  against  tyranny,  has  a 
better  title  to  "  Defender  of  the  Faith?  than  George  the 
third. 

As  *  military  man  your  lordship  may  hold  out  the  sword 
of  wav,  and  call  it  the  "  ultima  ratio  regum  .•"  the  last  rea- 
son oj  Kings ;  we  in  return  can  show  you  the  sword  of 
justice,  and  call  it,  "  the  best  scourge  of  tyrants."  The  first 
of  these  two  may  threaten,  or  even  frighten  for  a  while,  and 
cast  a  sickly  languor  over  an  insulted  people,  but  reason 
will  soon  recover  the  debauch,  and  restore  them  again  to 
tranquil  fortitude.  Your  lordship,  I  find,  has  now  com- 
menced author,  and  published  a  Proclamation ;  I  have  pub- 
lished a  Crisis ;  as  they  stand,  they  are  the  antipodes  of 
each  other ;  both  cannot  rise  at  once,  and  one  of  them  must 
desceiid ;  and  so  quick  is  the  revolution  of  things,  that  your 
lordship's  performance,  I  see,  has  already  fallen  many  de- 
grees irom  its  first  place,  and  is  now  just  visible  on  the  edge 
of  the  political  horizon. 

It  is  surprising  to  what  a  pitch  of  infatuation,  blind  folly 
and  obstinacy  will  carry  mankind,  and  your  lordship  s 
drowsv  proclamation  is  a  proof  that  it  does  not  even  quit 
them  in  their  sleep.  Perhaps  you  thought  America  too  was 
taking  a  nap,  and  therefore  chose,  like  Satan  to  Eve,  to 
whisper  the  delusion  softly,  lest  you  should  awaken  her. 
This  .continent,  sir,  is  too  extensive  to  sleep  all  at  once,  and 
too  watchful,  even  in  its  slumbers,  not  to  startle  at  the  un- 
hallowed foot  of  an  invader.  You  may  issue  your  procla- 
mations, and  welcome,  for  we  have  learned  to  "  reverence 
ourselves,"  and  scorn  the  insulting  ruffian  that  employs  you. 
America,  for  your  deceased  brother's  sake,  would  gladly 
have  shown  you  respect,  and  it  is  a  new  aggravation  to  her 
feelings,  that  Howe  should  be  forgetful,  and  raise  his  sword 
against  those,  who  at  their  own  charge  raised  a  monument 
to  his  brother.  But  your  master  has  commanded,  and  you 
have  not  enough  of  nature  left  to  refuse.  Surely  there 
must  be  something  strangely  degenerating  in  the  love  of 
monarchy,  that  can  so  completely  wear  a  man  down  to  an 
ingrate,  and  make  him  proud  to  lick  the  dust  that  kings 
have  trod  upon.  A  few  more  years,  should  you  survive 
them,  will  bestow  on  you  the  title  of  "  an  old  man ;"  and  in 


12  THE   CRISIS. 

some  hour  of  future  reflection  you  may  probably  find  the 
fitness  of  "Wolsey's  despairing  penitence — "  had  I  served  my 
God  as  faithfully  as  I  nave  served  mv  king,  he  would  not 
thus  have  forsaken  me  in  my  old  age. 

The  character  you  appear  to  us  in,  is  truly  ridiculous. 
Your  friends,  the  tories,  announced  your  coming,  with  high 
descriptions  of  your  unlimited  powers ;  but  your  proclama- 
tion has  given  tnem  the  lie,  by  showing  you  to  be  a  com- 
missioner without  authority.  Had  your  powers  been  ever 
so  great,  they  were  nothing  to  us,  further  than  we  pleased  ; 
because  we  had  the  same  right  which  other  nations  had,  to 
do  what  we  thought  was  best.  "  The  UNITED  STATES  of 
AMERICA,"  will  sound  as  pompously  in  the  world  or  in  his- 
tory, as  "  the  kingdom  of  Great  Britain  ;"  the  character  of 
General  Washington  will  fill  a  page  with  as  much  lustre  as 
that  of  Lord  Howe :  and  the  congress  have  as  much  right 
to  command  the  Icing  and  parliament  in  London,  to  desist 
from  legislation,  as  they  or  you  have  to  command  the  con- 
gress. Only  suppose  how  laughable  such  an  edict  would 
appear  from  us,  and  then,  in  that  merry  mood,  do  but  turn 
the  tables  upon  yourself,  andyou  will  see  how  your  procla- 
mation is  received  here.  Having  thus  placed  you  in  a 
proper  position  in  which  you  may  nave  a  full  view  of  your 
folly,  and  learn  to  despise  it,  I  hold  up  to  you,  for  that  pur- 
pose, the  following  quotation  from  your  own  lunarian  pro- 
clamation.— "  And  we  (lord  Howe  and  general  Howe)  do 
command  (and  in  his  majesty's  name  forsooth)  all  such  per- 
sons as  are  assembled  together,  under  the  name  of  general 
or  provincial  congresses,  committees,  conventions  or  other 
associations,  by  whatever  name  or  names  known  and  distin- 
guished, to  desist  and  cease  from  all  such  treasonable  actings 
and  doings." 

You  introduce  your  proclamation  by  referring  to  your 
declarations  of  the  14th  of  July  and  19th  of  September, 
In  the  last  of  these,  you  sunk  yourself  below  the  character 
of  a  private  gentleman.  That  I  may  not  seem  to  accuse 
you  unjustly,  I  shall  state  the  circumstance :  by  a  verbal 
invitation  of  yours,  communicated  to  congress  by  General 
Sullivan,  then  a  prisoner  on  his  parole,  you  signified  your 
desire  of  conferring  with  some  members  of  that  body  as  pri- 
vate gentlemen.  It  was  beneath  the  dignity  of  the  Ameri- 
can congress  to  pay  any  regard  to  a  message  that  at  best  was 
but  a  genteel  affront,  and  had  too  much  of  the  ministerial 
complexion  of  tampering  with  private  persons  ;  and  which 


THE   CRISIS.  13 

>robably  have  been  the  case,  had  the  gentlemen  who 
were  deputed  on  the  business,  possessed  that  kind  of  easy 
virtue  which  an  English  courtier  is  so  truly  distinguished  by. 
Your  request,  however,  was  complied  with,  for  honest  men 
are  naturally  more  tender  of  their  civil  than  their  political 
fame.  The  interview  ended  as  every  sensible  man  thought 
it  would  ;  for  your  lordship  knows,  as  well  as  the  writer  of 
the  Crisis,  that  it  is  impossible  for  the  king  of  England  to 
promise  the  repeal,  or  even  the  revisal  of  any  acts  of  parlia- 
ment; wherefore,  on  your  part,  you  had  nothing  to  say, 
more  than  to  request,  in  the  room  of  demanding,  tne  entire 
surrender  of  the  continent ;  and  then,  if  that  was  complied 
with,  to  promise  that  the  inhabitants  should  escape  with 
their  lives.  This  was  the  upshot  of  the  conference.  You 
informed  the  conferees  that  you  were  two  months  in  solicit- 
ing these  powers.  "We  ask,  what  powers?  for  as  commis- 
sioner you  have  none.  If  you  mean  the  power  of  pardon- 
ing, it  is  an  oblique  proof  that  your  master  was  determined 
to  sacrifice  all  before  him  :  and  that  you  were  two  months 
in  dissuading  him  from  his  purpose.  Another  evidence  of 
his  savage  obstinacy  !  From  your  own  account  of  the  mat- 
ter we  may  justly  draw  these  two  conclusions :  1st,  That  you 
serve  a  monster  ;  and  2d,  That  never  was  a  messenger  sent 
on  a  more  foolish  errand  than  yourself.  This  plain  language 
may  perhaps  sound  uncouthly  to  an  ear  vitiated  by  courtly 
refinements ;  but  words  were  made  for  use,  and  the  fault 
lies  in  deserving  them,  or  the  abuse  in  applying  them  un- 
fairly. 

Soon  after  your  return  to  New- York,  you  published  a  very 
illiberal  and  unmanly  handbill  against  the  congress  ;  for  it 
was  certainly  stepping  out  of  the  line  of  common  civility, 
first  to  screen  your  national  pride  by  soliciting  an  interview 
with  them  as  private  gentlemen,  and  in  the  conclusion  to 
endeavor  to  deceive  the  multitude  by  making  a  handbill  at- 
tack on  the  whole  body  of  the  congress ;  you  got  them  to- 
gether under  one  name,  and  abused  them  under  another. 
But  the  king  you  serve,  and  the  cause  you  support,  afford 
you  so  few  instances  of  acting  the  gentleman,  that  out  of 
pity  to  your  situation  the  congress  pardoned  the  insult  by 
taking  no  notice  of  it. 

You  say  in  that  handbill,  "  that  they,  the  congress,  disa- 
vowed every  purpose  for  reconciliation  not  consonant  with 
their  extravagant  and  inadmissible  claim  of  independence." 
Why,  God  bless  me !  what  have  you  to  do  with  our  inde- 


THE   CEI8I8. 


pendence  ?  We  ask  no  leave  of  yours  to  set  it  up  ;  we  ask 
no  money  of  yours  to  support  it ;  we  can  do  better  without 
your  fleets  and  armies  than  with  them ;  you  may  soon  have 
enough  to  do  to  protect  yourselves  without  being  burdened 
with  us.  We  are  very  willing  to  be  at  peace  with  you,  to 
buy  of  you  and  sell  to  you,  and,  like  young  beginners  in 
the  world,  to  work  for  our  living ;  therefore,  why  do  you 
put  yourselves  out  of  cash,  when  we  know  you  cannot  spare 
it,  and  we  do  not  desire  you  to  run  into  debt  ?  I  am  willing, 
sir,  that  you  should  see  your  folly  in  every  point  of  view  I 
can  place  it  in,  and  for  that  reason  descend  sometimes  to 
tell  you  in  jest  what  I  wish  you  to  see  in  earnest.  But  to 
be  more  serious  with  you,  why  do  you  say,  "  their  indepen- 
dence ?"  To  set  you  right,  sir,  we  tell  you,  that  the  inde- 
pendency is  ours,  not  theirs.  The  congress  were  authorised 
by  every  state  on  the  continent  to  publish  it  to  all  the 
world,  and  in  so  doing  are  not  to  be  considered  as  the  in- 
ventors, but  only  as  the  heralds  that  proclaimed  it,  or  the 
office  from  whicn  the  sense  of  the  people  received  a  legal 
form ;  and  it  was  as  much  as  any  or  all  their  heads  were 
worth,  to  have  treated  with  you  on  the  subject  of  submis- 
sion under  any  name  whatever.  But  we  know  the  men  in 
whom  we  have  trusted ;  can  England  say  the  same  of  her 
parliament  ? 

I  come  now  more  particularly  to  your  proclamation  of 
the  30th  of  November  last.  Had  you  gained  an  entire 
conquest  over  all  the  armies  of  America,  and  then  put  forth 
a  proclamation,  offering  (what  you  call)  mercy,  your  conduct 
would  have  had  some  specious  show  of  humanity ;  but  to 
creep  by  surprise  into  a  province,  and  there  endeavor  to  ter- 
rify and  seduce  the  inhabitants  from  their  just  allegiance  to 
the  rest  by  promises,  which  you  neither  meant,  nor  were 
able  to  fulfil,  is  both  cruel  and  unmanly :  cruel  in  its  effects ; 
because,  unless  you  can  keep  all  the  ground  you  have 
marched  over,  how  are  you,  in  the  words  of  your  proclama- 
tion, to  secure  to  your  proselytes  "  the  enjoyment  of  their 
property  ?"  WTiat  is  to  become  either  of  your  new  adopted 
subjects,  or  your  old  friends,  the  tories,  in  Burlington,  Bor- 
dentown,  Trenton,  Mountholly,  and  many  other  places, 
where  you  proudly  lorded  it  for  a  few  days,  and  then  fled 
with  the  precipitation  of  a  pursued  thief?  What,  I  say,  IB 
to  become  of  those  wretches  ?  What  is  to  become  of  tnose 
who  went  over  to  you  from  this  city  and  state  ?  What  more 
can  you  say  to  them  than  "  shift  for  yourselves  ?"  Or 


THE   CRISIS.  15 

more  can  they  hope  for  than  to  wander  like  vagabonds  over 
the  face  of  the  earth  ?  You  may  now  tell  them  to  take  their 
leave  of  America,  and  all  that  once  was  theirs.  Recommend 
them,  for  consolation,  to  your  master's  court ;  there  perhaps 
they  may  make  a  shift  to  live  on  the  scraps  of  some  dangling 
parasite,  and  choose  companions  among  thousands  like 
themselves.  A  traitor  is  the  foulest  fiend  on  earth. 

In  a  political  sense  we  ought  to  thank  you  for  thus 
bequeathing  estates  to  the  continent ;  we  shall  soon,  at  this 
rate,  be  able  to  carry  on  a  war  without  expense,  and  grow 
rich  by  the  ill  policyof  Lord  Howe,  and  the  generous  defec- 
tion of  the  tones.  Had  you  set  your  foot  into  this  city,  you 
would  have  bestowed  estates  upon  us  which  we  never  thought 
of,  by  bringing  forth  traitors  we  were  unwilling  to  suspect. 
But  these  men,  you'll  say,  "are  his  majesty's  most  faithful 
subjects  ;"  let  that  honor,  then,  be  all  their  fortune,  and  let 
his  majesty  take  them  to  himself. 

I  am  now  thoroughly  disgusted  with  them ;  they  live  in 
ungrateful  ease,  and  bend  their  whole  minds  to  mischief.  It 
seems  as  if  god  had  given  them  over  to  a  spirit  of  infidelity, 
and  that  they  are  open  to  conviction  in  no  other  line  but 
that  of  punishment.  It  is  time  to  have  done  with  tarring, 
feathering,  carting,  and  taking  securities  for  their  future 
good  behaviour ;  every  sensible  man  must  feel  a  conscious 
shame  at  seeing  a  poor  fellow  hawked  for  a  show  about  the 
streets,  when  it  is  known  he  is  only  the  tool  of  some  princi- 
pal villain,  biassed  into  his  offence  by  the  force  of  false  rea- 
soning, or  bribed  thereto,  through  sad  necessity.  We 
dishonor  ourselves  by  attacking  such  trifling  characters 
while  greater  ones  are  suffered  to  escape ;  'tis  our  duty  to 
find  them  out,  and  their  proper  punishment  would  be  tc 
exile  them  from  the  continent  for  ever.  The  circle  of  then: 
is  not  so  great  as  some  imagine ;  the  influence  of  a  few  have 
tainted  many  who  are  not  naturally  corrupt.  A  continua. 
circulation  of  lies  among  those  who  are  not  much  in  the 
way  of  hearing  them  contradicted,  will  in  time  pass  for 
truth ;  and  the  crime  lies  not  in  the  believer  but  the  inven- 
tor. I  am  not  for  declaring  war  with  every  man  that  appears 
not  so  warm  as  myself :  difference  of  constitution,  temper, 
habit  of  speaking,  and  many  other  things,  will  go  a  great 
way  in  fixing  the  outward  character  of  a  man,  yet  simple 
honesty  may  remain  at  bottom.  Some  men  have  naturally 
a  military  turn,  and  can  brave  hardships  and  the  risk  of  life 
with  a  cheerful  face  ;  others  have  not ;  no  slavery  appears 


16  THE   CRISIS. 

to  them  so  great  as  the  fatigue  of  arms,  and  no  terror  BO 
powerful  as  that  of  personal  danger.  What  can  we  say  ? 
We  cannot  alter  nature,  neither  ought  we  to  punish  the  son 
"because  the  father  begot  him  in  a  cowardly  mood.  How- 
ever, I  believe  most  men  have  more  courage  than  they  know 
of,  and  that  a  little  at  first  is  enough  to  begin  with.  1  fcnew 
the  time  when  I  thought  that  the  whistling  of  a  cannon  ball 
would  have  frightened  me  almost  to  death  :  but  I  have  since 
tried  it,  and  find  that  I  can  stand  it  with  as  little  discompo- 
sure, and,  I  believe,  with  a  much  easier  conscience  than 
your  lordship.  The  same  dread  would  return  to  me  again 
were  I  in  your  situation,  for  my  solemn  belief  of  your  cause 
is,  that  it  is  hellish  and  damnable,  and,  under  that  convic- 
tion, every  thinking  man's  heart  must  fail  him. 

From  a  concern  that  a  good  cause  should  be  dishonored 
by  the  least  disunion  among  us,  I  said  in  my  former  paper. 
No.  1,  "  That  should  the  enemy  now  be  expelled,  I  wish 
with  all  the  sincerity  of  a  Christian,  that  the  names  of  whig 
and  tory  might  never  more  be  mentioned,"  but  there  is  a  knot 
of  men  among  us  of  such  a  venomous  cast,  that  they  will 
not  admit  even  one's  good  wishes  to  act  in  their  favor.  In- 
stead of  rejoicing  that  heaven  had,  as  it  were,  providentially 
preserved  this  city  from  plunder  and  destruction,  by  deliv- 
ering so  great  a  part  of  the  enemy  into  our  hands  with  so 
little  effusion  of  blood,  they  stubbornly  affected  to  disbelieve 
it  till  within  an  hour,  nay,  half  an  hour,  of  the  prisoners 
arriving  ;  and  the  Quakers  put  forth  a  testimony,  dated  the 
20th  of  December,  signed  "  John  Pemberton,"  declaring 
their  attachment  to  the  British  government.*  Thes^  men 
are  continually  harping  on  the  great  sin  of  our  bearing  arms, 
but  the  king  of  Britain  may  lay  waste  the  world  in  blood 
and  famine,  and  they,  poor  fallen  souls,  have  nothing  to  say. 

In  some  future  paper,  I  intend  to  distinguish  between  the 
different  kind  of  persons  who  have  been  denominated  tories ; 
for  this  I  am  clear  in,  that  all  are  not  so  who  have  been 
called  so,  nor  all  men  whigs  who  were  once  thought  &o ;  and 

*  I  have  ever  been  careful  of  charging  offences  upon  whole  societies  of  men, 
but  as  the  paper  referred  to  is  put  forth  by  an  unknown  set  of  men,  who  claim 
to  themselves  the  right  of  representing  the  whole;  and  while  the  whole  soci- 
ety of  Quakers  admit  its  validity  by  a  silent  acknowledgment,  it  is  impossible 
that  any  distinction  can  be  made  by  the  public :  and  the  more  so,  because 
the  New-York  paper  of  the  30th  of  December,  printed  by  permission  of  our 
enemies,  says  that  "  the  Quakers  begin  to  speak  openly  of  their  attachment 
to  the  British  constitution.  We  are  certain  that  we  have  many  frienJs  among 
them,  and  wish  to  know  them. 


THE   CRISIS.  17 

a&  I  mean  not  to  conceal  the  name  of  any  true  friend  when 
there  shall  be  occasion  to  mention  him,  neither  will  I  that 
of  an  enemy,  who  ought  to  be  known,  let  his  rank,  station 
or  religion  be  what  it  may.  Much  pains  have  been  taken 
by  some  to  set  your  lordship's  private  character  in  an 
amiable  light,  but  as  it  has  cniefly  been  done  by  men  who 
know  nothing  about  you,  and  who  are  no  ways  remarkable 
for  their  attachment  to  us,  we  have  no  just  authority  for 
believing  it.  George  the  third  has  imposed  upon  us  by  the 
same  arts,  but  time,  at  length,  has  done  him  justice,  and  the 
same  fate  may  probably  attend  your  lordship.  Your  avowed 
purpose  here,  is  to  kill,  conquer,  plunder,  pardon  and  enslave ; 
and  the  ravages  of  your  army  though  the  Jerseys  have  been 
marked  with  as  much  barbarism  as  if  you  had  openly  pro- 
fessed yourself  the  prince  of  ruffians ;  not  even  tne  appear 
ance  of  humanity  has  been  preserved  either  on  the  march  or 
the  retreat  of  your  troops ;  no  general  order  that  I  could 
ever  learn,  has  ever  been  issued  to  prevent  or  even  forbid 
your  troops  from  robbery,  wherever  they  came,  and  the  only 
instance  of  justice,  if  it  can  be  called  such,  which  has  dis- 
tinguished you  for  impartiality,  is,  that  you  treated  and 
plundered  all  alike;  what  could  not  be  carried  away  has 
been  destroyed,  and  mahogany  furniture  has  been  deliber- 
ately laid  on  fire  for  fuel,  rather  than  that  men  should  be 
fatigued  with  cutting  wood.*  There  was  a  time  when  the 
whigs  confided  much  in  your  supposed  candor,  and  the 
tories  rested  themselves  in  your  favor  ;  the  experiments  have 
now  been  made,  and  failed ;  in  every  town,  nay,  every 
cottage,  in  the  Jerseys,  where  your  arms  have  been,  is  a 
testimony  against  you.  How  you  mav  rest  under  the  sacri- 
fice of  character  I  know  not ;  but  this  I  know,  that  you 
sleep  and  rise  with  the  daily  curses  of  thousands  upon  you ; 
perhaps  the  misery  which  the  tories  have  suffered  by  your 
proffered  mercy,  may  give  them  some  claim  to  their  country's 
pity,  and  be  in  the  end  the  best  favor  you  could  show  them, 
in  a  folio  general-order  book  belonging  to  Col.  Rhol's 
battalion,  taken  at  Trenton,  and  now  in  me  possession  of  the 
council  of  safety  for  this  state,  the  following  barbarous  order 
is  frequently  repeated,  "  His  excellency  the  c&mmander-inr 

*  As  some  people  may  doubt  the  truth  of  such  wanton  destruction,  I  think 
it  necessary  to  inform  them,  that  one  of  the  people  called  Quakers,  who  livea 
at  Trenton,  gave  me  this  information,  at  the  house  of  Mr.  Michael  Hutchinson 
(one  of  the  same  profession,)  who  lives  near  Trenton  ferry  on  the  Pennsylvania 
tide,  Mr.  Hutchinson  being  present. 


18  THE   CRISIS. 

chief  orders,  that  all  inhabitants  who  shall  be  found  with 
arms,  not  having  an  officer  with  them,  shall  be  immediately 
taken  and  hnng  up."  How  many  you  may  thus  have  pri- 
vately sacrificed,  we  know  not,  and  the  account  can  only  be 
settled  in  another  world.  Your  treatment  of  prisoners,  in 
order  to  distress  them  to  enlist  in  your  infernal  service,  is 
not  to  be  equalled  by  any  instance  in  Europe.  Yet  this  is  the 
humane  lord  Howe  and  his  brother,  whom  the  tories  and 
their  three-quarter  kindred,  the  Quakers,  or  some  of  them 
at  least,  have  been  holding  up  for  patterns  of  justice  and 
mercy  I 

A  bad  cause  will  ever  be  supported  by  bad  means  and  bad 
men ;  and  whoever  will  be  at  the  pains  of  examining  strictly 
into  things,  will  find  that  one  and  the  same  spirit  of  oppres- 
sion and  impiety,  more  or  less,  governs  through  your  whole 
party  in  both  countries:  not  many  days  ago  I  accidentally 
fell  in  company  with  a  person  of  this  city  noted  for  espousing 
your  cause,  and  on  my  remarking  to  him,  "  that  it  appeared 
clear  to  me,  by  the  late  providential  turn  of  affairs,  that 
God  Almighty  was  visibly  on  our  side,"  he  replied,  ''  We 
care  nothing  for  that,  you  may  have  Him,  and  welcome ;  if 
we  have  but  enough  of  the  devil  on  our  side,  we  shall  do." 
However  carelessly  this  might  be  spoken,  matters  not,  'tis 
still  the  insensible  principle  that  directs  all  your  conduct,  and 
will  at  last  most  assuredly  deceive  and  ruin  you. 

If  ever  a  nation  was  mad  or  foolish,  blind  to  its  own  in- 
terest and  bent  on  its  own  destruction,  it  is  Britain.  There 
are  such  things  as  national  sins,  and  though  the  punish- 
ment of  individuals  may  be  reserved  to  another  world, 
national  punishment  can  only  be  inflicted  in  this  world. 
Britain,  as  a  nation,  is,  in  my  inmost  belief,  the  greatest 
and  most  ungrateful  offender  against  God  on  the  face  of  the 
whole  earth  ;  blessed  with  all  the  commerce  she  could  have 
wished  for,  and  furnished,  by  a  vast  extension  of  dominion, 
with  the  means  of  civilizing  both  the  eastern  and  western 
world,  she  has  made  no  otner  use  of  both  than  proudly  to 
idolize  her  own  "  thunder,"  and  rip  up  the  bowels  of  whole 
countries  for  what  she  could  get :  Like  Alexander,  she  has 
made  war  her  sport,  and  inflicted  misery  for  prodigality's 
sake.  The  blood  of  India  is  not  yet  repaid,  nor  the  wretched- 
ness of  Africa,  yet  requited.  Of  late  she  has  enlarged  her 
list  of  national  cruelties,  by  her  butcherly  destruction  of  th< 
Caribbs  of  St.  Vincent's,  and  returning  an  answer  by  tho 
sword  to  the  meek  prayer  for  "  Peace,  liberty  and  safety* 


THE   CRISIS.  IJc 

These  are  serious  things,  and  whatever  a  foolish  tyrant,  a  de- 
bauched court,  a  trafficking  legislature,  or  a  blinded  people 
may  think,  the  national  account  with  heaven  must  some 
day  or  other  be  settled ;  all  countries  have  sooner  or  later 
been  called  to  their  reckoning ;  the  proudest  empires  have 
sunk  when  the  balance  was  struck  ;  and  Britain,  like  an  in- 
dividual penitent  must  undergo  her  day  of  sorrow,  and  the 
sooner  it  happens  to  her  the  better :  as  I  wish  it  6ver,  I 
wish  it  to  come,  but  withal  wish  that  it  may  be  as  light  as 
possible. 

Perhaps  your  lordship  has  no  taste  for  serious  things  ;  by 
your  connexions  with  England  I  should  suppose  not :  there- 
fore I  shall  drop  this  part  of  the  subject,  and  take  it  up  in  a 
line  in  which  you  will  better  understand  me. 

By  what  means,  may  I  ask,  do  you  expect  to  conquer 
America  ?  If  you  could  not  affect  it  in  the  summer,  when 
our  army  was  less  than  yours,  nor  in  the  winter,  when  we 
had  none,  how  are  you  to  do  it  ?  In  point  of  generalship 
you  have  been  outwitted,  and  in  point  of  fortitude  outdone ; 
your  advantages  turn  out  to  your  loss,  and  show  us  that  it 
is  in  our  power  to  ruin  you  by  gifts :  like  a  game  of  drafts, 
we  can  move  out  of  one  square  to  let  you  come  in,  in  order 
that  we  may  afterwards  take  two  or  three  for  one  :  and  as  we 
can  always  keep  a  double  corner  for  ourselves,  we  can  always 
prevent  a  total  defeat.  You  cannot  be  so  insensible,  as  not 
to  see  that  we  have  two  to  one  the  advantage  of  you,  be- 
cause we  conquer  by  a  drawn  game,  and  you  lose  by  it. 
Burgoyne  might  have  taught  your  lordship  this  knowledge ; 
he  has  been  long  a  student  in  the  doctrine  of  chances. 

I  have  no  other  idea  of  conquering  countries  than  by  sub- 
duing the  armies  which  defend  them :  have  you  done  this, 
or  can  you  do  it  ?  If  you  have  not,  it  would  be  civil  in  you 
to  let  your  proclamations  alone  for  the  present ;  otherwise, 
you  will  ruin  more  tories  by  your  grace  and  favor,  than  you 
will  whigs  by  your  arms. 

Were  you  to  obtain  possession  of  this  city,  you  would  not 
know  what  to  do  with  it  more  than  to  plunder  it.  To  hold 
it  in  the  manner  you  hold  New- York,  would  be  an  addi- 
tional dead  weight  upon  your  hands :  and  if  a  general  con- 
quest is  your  object,  you  had  better  be  without  the  city 
tnan  with  it.  TV  hen  you  have  defeated  all  our  armies,  the 
cities  will  fall  into  your  hands  of  themselves  ;  but  to  creep 
into  them  in  the  manner  you  got  into  Princeton,  Trenton, 
etc.,  ig  like  robbing  an  orchard  in  the  night  before  the  fruit 


20  THE  CK6I8. 

be  ripe,  and  running  away  in  the  morning.  Tour  experi- 
ment in  the  Jerseys  is  sufficient  to  teach  you  that  you  have 
something  more  to  do  than  barely  to  get  into  other  people's 
houses ;  and  your  new  converts,  to  whom  you  promised  all 
manner  of  protection,  and  seduced  into  new  guilt  by  par- 
doning them  from  their  former  virtues,  must  begin  to  have 
a  very  contemptible  opinion  both  of  your  power  and  your 
policy.  Your  authority  in  the  Jerseys  is  now  reduced  to 
the  small  circle  which  your  army  occupies,  and  your  pro- 
clamation is  no  where  else  seen  unless  it  be  to  be  laughed  at. 
The  mighty  subduers  of  the  continent  have  retreated  into  a 
nut-shell,  and  the  proud  forgivers  of  our  sins  are  fled  from 
those  they  came  to  pardon :  and  all  this  at  a  time  when 
they  were  despatching  vessel  after  vessel  to  England  with 
the  great  news  of  every  day.  In  short,  you  have  managed 
your  Jersey  expedition  so  very  dexterously,  that  the  dead 
only  are  conquerors,  because  none  will  dispute  the  ground 
with  them. 

In  all  the  wars  which  you  have  formerly  been  concerned 
in,  you  had  only  armies  to  contend  with  ;  in  this  case  you 
have  both  an  army  and  a  country  to  combat  with.  In  for- 
mer wars,  the  countries  followed  the  fate  of  their  capitals ; 
Canada  fell  with  Quebec,  and  Minorca  with  Port  Mahon  or 
St.  Phillips ;  by  subduing  those,  the  conquerors  opened  a 
way  into,  and  became  masters  of  the  .country :  here  it  is 
otherwise ;  if  you  get  possession  of  a  city  here,  you  are 
obliged  to  shut  yourselves  up  in  it,  and  can  make  no  other 
use  of  it,  than  to  spend  your  country's  money  in.  This  is 
all  the  advantage  you  have  drawn  from  New-York ;  and 
you  would  draw  less  from  Philadelphia,  because  it  requires 
more  force  to  keep  it,  and  is  much  further  from  the  sea.  A 
pretty  figure  you  and  the  tories  would  cut  in  this  city,  with 
a  river  full  of  ice,  and  a  town  full  of  fire ;  for  the  immediate 
consequence  of  your  getting  here  would  be,  that  you  would 
be  cannonaded  out  again,  and  the  tories  be  obliged  to  make 
good  the  damage  ;  and  this  sooner  or  later  will  be  the  fate 
of  New- York. 

I  wish  to  see  the  city  saved,  not  so  much  from  military  as 
from  natural  motives.  "Tis  the  hiding  place  of  women  and 
children,  and  lord  Howe's  proper  business  is  with  our  armies. 
When  I  put  all  the  circumstances  together  which  ought  to 
be  taken,  I  laugh  at  your  notion  of  conquering  America. 
Because  you  lived  in  a  little  country,  where  an  army  might 
run  over  the  whole  in  a  few  days,  and  where  a  single  com- 


THE   CRI8I8.  21 

p»ny  of  soldiers  might  put  a  multitude  to  the  rout,  you 
expected  to  find  it  the  same  here.  It  is  plain  that  you 
brought  over  with  you  all  the  narrow  notions  you  were  bred 
up  with,  and  imagined  that  a  proclamation  in  the  king's 
name  was  to  do  great  things ;  but  Englishmen  always  travel 
for  knowledge,  and  your  lordship,  I  hope,  will  return,  if  you 
return  at  all,  much  wiser  than  you  came. 

"We  may  be  surprised  by  events  we  did  not  expect,  and  in 
that  interval  of  recollection  you  may  gain  some  temporary 
advantage :  such  was  the  case  a  few  weeks  ago,  but  we  soon 
ripen  again  into  reason,  collect  our  strength,  and  while  you 
are  preparing  for  a  triumph,  we  come  upon  you  with  a 
defeat.  Such  it  has  been,  and  such  it  would  be  were  you  to 
try  it  a  hundred  times  over.  Were  you  to  garrison  the 
places  you  might  march  over,  in  order  to  secure  their  sub- 
jection, (for  remember  you  can  do  it  by  no  other  means,) 
your  army  would  be  like  a  stream  of  water  running  to 
nothing.  By  the  time  you  extended  from  New- York  to 
Virginia,  you  would  be  reduced  to  a  string  of  drops  not 
capable  of  hanging  together ;  while  we,  by  retreating  from 
state  to  state,  like  a  river  turning  back  upon  itself,  would 
acquire  strength  in  the  same  proportion  as  you  lost  it,  and 
in  the  end  be  capable  of  overwhelming  you.  The  country, 
in  the  mean  time,  would  suffer,  but  it  is  a  day  of  suffering, 
and  we  ought  to  expect  it.  What  we  contend  for  is  worthy 
the  affliction  we  may  go  through.  If  we  get  but  bread  to 
eat,  and  any  kind  of  raiment  to  put  on,  we  ought  not  only 
to  be  contented,  but  thankful.  More  than  that  we  ought 
not  to  look  for,  and  less  than  that  heaven  has  not  yet  suffered 
us  to  want.  He  that  would  sell  his  birth  right  for  a  little 
salt,  is  as  worthless  as  he  who  sold  it  for  porridge  without 
salt.  And  he  that  would  part  with  it  for  a  gay  coat,  or  a 
plain  coat,  ought  for  ever  to  be  a  slave  in  buff.  What 
are  salt,  sugar  and  finery,  to  the  inestimable  blessings  of 
"  Liberty  and  safety !"  Or  what  are  the  inconveniences  of 
a  few  months  to  the  tributary  bondage  of  ages  ?  The  mean- 
est peasant  in  America,  blest  with  these  sentiments,  is  a 
happy  man  compared  with  a  New- York  tory ;  he  can  eat 
his  morsel  without  repining,  and  when  he  has  done,  can 
sweeten  it  with  a  repast  of  wholesome  air;  he  can  take 
his  child  by  the  hand  and  bless  it,  without  feeling  the  con- 
scious shame  of  neglecting  a  parent's  duty. 

In  publishing  these  remarks  I  have  several  objects  in 
view. 


22  THE    CRISIS. 

On  your  part  they  are  to  expose  the  folly  of  your  pre- 
tended authority  as  a  commissioner ;  the  wickedness  of  your 
cause  in  general ;  and  the  impossibility  of  your  conquering 
us  at  any  rate.  On  the  part  of  the  public,  my  intention  is, 
to  show  them  their  true  and  solid  interest ;  to  encourage 
them  to  their  own  good,  to  remove  the  fears  and  falsities 
which  bad  men  have  spread,  and  weak  men  have  encouraged ; 
and  to  excite  in  all  men  a  love  for  union,  and  a  cheerfulness 
for  duty. 

I  shall  submit  one  more  case  to  you  respecting  your  con- 
quest of  this  country,  and  then  proceed  to  new  observations. 

Suppose  our  armies  in  every  part  of  this  continent  were 
immediately  to  disperse,  every  man  to  his  home,  or  where 
else  he  might  be  safe,  and  engage  to  re-assemble  again  on  a 
certain  future  day ;  it  is  clear  that  you  would  then  have  no 
army  to  contend  with,  yet  you  would  be  as  much  at  a  loss 
in  that  case  as  you  are  now ;  you  would  be  afraid  to  send 
your  troops  in  parties  over  the  continent,  either  to  disarm  or 
prevent  us  from  assembling,  lest  they  should  not  return ;  and 
while  you  kept  them  together,  having  no  army  of  ours  to 
dispute  with,  you  could  not  call  it  a  conquest ;  you  might 
furnish  out  a  pompous  page  in  the  London  Gazette  or  a 
New- York  paper,  but  wnen  we  returned  at  the  appointed 
time,  you  would  have  the  same  work  to  do  that  you  had  at 
first. 

It  has  been  the  folly  of  Britain  to  suppose  herself  more 
powerful  than  she  really  is,  and  by  that  means  has  arrogated 
to  herself  a  rank  in  the  world  she  is  not  entitled  to :  for 
more  than  this  century  past  she  has  not  been  able  to  carry 
on  a  war  without  foreign  assistance.  In  Marlborough's 
campaigns,  and  from  that  day  to  this,  the  number  of  Ger- 
man troops  and  officers  assisting  her  have  been  about  equal 
with  her  own  ;  ten  thousand  Hessians  were  sent  to  England 
last  war  to  protect  her  from  a  French  invasion ;  and  she 
would  have  cut  but  a  poor  figure  in  her  Canadian  and  West- 
Indian  expeditions,  had  not  America  been  lavish  both  of 
her  money  and  men  to  help  her  along.  The  only  instance 
in  which  she  was  engaged  singly,  that  I  can  recollect,  was 
against  the  rebellion  in  Scotland,  in  the  years  1Y45  and  1746, 
and  in  that,  out  of  three  battles,  she  was  twice  beaten,  till 
by  thus  reducing  thoir  numbers,  (as  we  shall  yours,)  and 
taking  a-  supply  ship  that  was  coming  to  Scotland  with 
clothes,  arms  and  money,  (as  we  have  often  done,)  she  was 
at  last  enabled  to  defeat  them.  England  wae  never  famous 


I 

THE   CKI8I8. 


oy  land  ;  her  officers  have  generally  been  suspected  of  covr- 
ardiee,  have  more  of  the  air  of  a  dancing-master  than  a  sol- 
dier, and  by  the  samples  which  we  have  taken  prisoners,  we 
give  the  preference  to  ourselves.  Her  strength,  of  late,  has 
Iain  in  her  extravagance  ;  bnt  as  her  finances  and  credit  are 
now  low,  her  sinews  in  that  line  begin  to  fail  fast.  As  a 
nation  she  is  the  poorest  in  Europe  ;  for  were  the  whole 
kingdom,  and  all  that  is  in  it,  to  be  put  up  for  sale  like  the 
estate  of  a  bankrupt,  it  would  not  fetch  as  much  as  she  owes  ; 
yet  this  thoughtless  wretch  must  go  to  war,  and  with  the 
avowed  design,  too,  of  making  us  beasts  of  burden,  to  sup- 
port her  in  not  and  debauchery,  and  to  assist  her  afterwards 
in  distressing  those  nations  who  are  now  our  best  friends. 
This  ingratitude  may  suit  a  tory,  or  the  unchristian  peevish- 
ness of  a  fallen  Quaker,  but  none  else. 

Tis  the  unhappy  temper  of  the  English  to  be  pleased  with 
any  war,  right  or  wrong,  be  it  but  successful  ;  but  they  soon 
grow  discontented  with  ill-fortune,  and  it  is  an  even  cnance 
that  they  are  as  clamorous  for  peace  next  summer,  a*  the 
king  and  his  ministers  were  for  war  last  winter.  In  this  na- 
tural view  of  things,  your  lordship  stands  in  a  very  critical 
situation  :  your  whole  character  is  now  staked  upon  your 
laurels  ;  if  they  wither,  you  wither  with  them  ;  if  they 
flourish,  you  cannot  live  long  to  look  at  them  ;  and  at  any 
rate,  the  black  account  hereafter  is  not  far  off.  What  lately 
appeared  to  us  misfortunes,  were  only  blessings  in  disguise  ; 
and  the  seeming,  advantages  on  your  side  have  turned  out 
to  our  profit.  Even  our  loss  of  this  city,  as  far  as  we  can  see, 
might  be  a  principal  gain  to  us  :  the  more  surface  you  spread 
over,  the  thinner  you  will  be,  ard  the  easier  wiped  away  ; 
and  our  consolation  under  that  apparent  disaster  would  be, 
that  the  estates  of  the  tories  would  become  securities  for  the 
repairs.  In  short,  there  is  no  old  ground  we  can  fail  upon, 
but  some  new  foundation  rises  again  to  support  us.  "  We 
have  put,  sir,  our  hands  to  the  plough,  and  cursed  be  he  that 
looketh  back." 

Tour  king,  in  his  speech  to  parliament  last  spring,  de- 
clared, "  That  he  had  no  doubt  but  the  great  force  they  had 
enabled  him  to  send  to  America,  would  effectually  reduce 
the  rebellious  colonies."  It  has  not,  neither  can  it  ;  but  it 
has  done  just  enough  to  lay  the  foundation  of  its  own  next 
year's  ruin.  You  are  sensible  that  you  left  England  in  a 
divided,  distracted  state  of  politics,  and,  by  the  command 
you  had  there,  you  became  tne  principal  prop  of  the  court 


> 

24  THE   CRISIS. 

party ;  their  fortunes  rest  on  yours ;  by  a  single  express  you 
can  fix  their  value  with  the  public,  and  the  degree  to  which 
their  spirits  shall  rise  or  fall ;  they  are  in  your  hands  as 
stock,  and  you  have  the  secret  of  the  alley  with  you.  Thus 
situated  and  connected,  you  become  the  unintentional  me- 
chanical instrument  of  your  own  and  their  overthrow.  The 
king  and  his  ministers  put  conquest  out  of  doubt,  and  the 
credit  of  both  depended  on  the  proof.  To  support  them  in 
the  interim,  it  was  necessary  that  you  should  make  the  most 
of  every  thing,  and  we  can  tell  by  Hugh  Game's  New- York 
paper  what  the  complexion  of  the  London  Gazette  is.  With 
such  a  list  of  victories  the  nation  cannot  expect  you  will  ask 
new  supplies  ;  and  to  confess  your  want  of  them,  would  give 
the  lie  to  your  triumphs,  and  impeach  the  king  and  his 
ministers  of  treasonable  deception.  If  you  make  the  neces- 
sary demand  at  home,  your  party  sinks ;  if  you  make  it  not, 
you  sink  yourself;  to  ask  it  now  is  too  late,  and  to  ask  it 
before  was  too  soon,  and  unless  it  arrive  quickly  will  be  of 
no  use.  In  short,  the  part  you  have  to  act,  cannot  be  acted ; 
and  I  am  fully  persuaded  that  all  you  ha  ve  to  trust  to  is,  to 
do  the  best  you  can  with  what  force  you  have  got,  or  little 
more.  Though  we  have  greatly  exceeded  you  in  point  of 
generalship  and  bravery  of  men,  yet,  as  a  people,  we  have 
not  entered  into  the  full  soul  of  enterprise ;  for  I,  who  know 
England  and  the  disposition  of  the  people  well,  am  confi- 
dent, that  it  is  easier  for  us  to  effect  a  revolution  there,  than 
you  a  conquest  here  ;  a  few  thousand  men  landed  in  Eng- 
land with  the  declared  design  of  deposing  the  present  king, 
bringing  his  ministers  to  trial,  and  setting  up  the  Duke  of 
Gloucester  in  his  stead,  would  assuredly  carry  their  point, 
while  you  were  grovelling  here  ignorant  of  the  matter.  As 
I  send  all  my  papers  to  England,  this,  like  Common  Sense, 
will  find  its  way  there ;  and  though  it  may  put  one  party 
on  their  guard,  it  will  inform  the  other,  and  the  nation  in 
general,  of  our  design  to  help  them. 

Thus  far,  sir,  I  have  endeavored  to  give  you  a  picture  of 
present  affairs :  you  may  draw  from  it  what  conclusions  you 
please.  I  wish  as  well  to  the  true  prosperity  of  England  as 
you  can,  but  I  consider  INDEPENDENCE  Americans  natural 
right  and  interest,  and  never  could  see  any  real  disservice  it 
would  be  to  Britain.  If  an  English  merchant  receives  an 
order,  and  is  paid  for  it,  it  signifies  nothing  to  him  who  gov- 
erns the  country.  This  is  my  creed  of  politics.  If  I  have 
any  where  expressed  myself  over-warmly,  'tis  from  a  fixed, 


THE   CRISIS.  25 

unmoveable  hatred  1  have,  and  ever  had,  to  cruel  men  and 
jruel  measures.  I  have  likewise  an  aversion  to  monarchy, 
AS  being  too  debasing  to  the  dignity  of  man ;  but  I  never 
troubled  others  with  my  notions  tin  very  lately,  nor  ever 
published  a  syllable  in  England  in  my  lite.  "Wnat  I  write 
is  pure  nature,  and  my  pen  and  my  soul  have  ever  gone 
together.  My  writings  I  have  always  given  away,  reserv- 
ing only  the  expense  of  printing  and  paper,  and  sometimes 
not  even  that.  I  never  courted  either  fame  or  interest,  and 
my  manner  of  life,  to  those  who  know  it,  will  justify  what 
I  say.  My  study  is  to  be  useful,  and  if  your  lordship  loves 
mankind  as  well  as  I  do,  you  would,  seeing  you  cannot  con- 
quer us,  cast  about  and  lend  your  hand  towards  accomplish- 
ing a  peace.  Our  independence,  with  God's  blessing,  we 
wm  maintain  against  all  the  world ;  but  as  we  wish  to  avoid 
evil  ourselves,  we  wish  not  to  inflict  it  on  others.  I  am  never 
over-inquisitive  into  the  secrets  of  the  cabinet,  but  I  have 
some  notion,  that  if  you  neglect  the  present  opportunity, 
that  it  will  not  be  in  our  power  to  make  a  separate  peace 
with  you  afterwards ;  for  whatever  treaties  or  alliances  we 
form,  we  shall  most  faithfully  abide  by ;  wherefore  you  may 
be  deceived  if  you  think  you  can  make  it  with  us  at  any 
time.  A  lasting,  independent  peace  is  my  wish,  end  and 
aim ;  and  to  accomplish  that,  "  I  pray  God  the  Americans 
may  never  be  defeated,  and  I  trust  while  they  have  good 
officers,  and  are  well  commanded"  and  willing  to  be  com 
manded,  "  that  they  NEVEB  WILL  BE." 

COMMON  SENSE. 

Philadelphia,  Jan.  18, 1777. 


1OTMBEK  HL 

IN  the  progress  of  politics,  as  in  the  common  occurrences 
of  life,  we  are  not  only  apt  to  forget  the  ground  we  have 
travelled  over,  but  frequently  neglect  to  gather  up  expe- 
rience as  we  go.  We  expena,  if  I  may  so  say,  the  know- 
*edge  of  every  day  on  the  circumstances  that  produce  it,  and 
journey  on  in  search  of  new  matter  and  new  refinements : 
but  as  it  is  pleasant  and  /sometimes  useful  to  look  back,  even 
to  the  first  periods  of  infancy,  and  trace  the  turns  and  wind- 
ings through  which  we  have  passed,  so  we  may  likewise 


THE    CRISIS. 


derive  many  advantages  by  halting  a  while  in  our 
career,  and  taking  a  review  of  the  wondrous  complicated 
labyrinth  of  little  more  than  yesterday. 

Truly  may  we  say,  that  never  did  men  grow  old  in  so 
short  a  time !  "We  nave  crowded  the  business  of  an  age  into 
the  compass  of  a  few  months,  and  have  been  driven  through 
such  a  rapid  succession  of  things,  that  for  the  want  of  leisure 
to  think,  we  unavoidably  wasted  knowledge  as  we  came,  and 
have  left  nearly  as  much  behind  us  as  we  brought  with  us :  but 
the  road  is  yet  rich  with  the  fragments,  and,  before  we  fully 
lose  sight  of  them,  will  repay  us  for  the  trouble  of  stopping 
to  pick  them  up. 

W  ere  a  man  to  be  totally  deprived  of  memory,  he  would 
be  incapable  of  forming  any  just  opinion ;  every  thing  about 
him  would  seem  a  chaos ;  he  would  have  even  his  own  his- 
tory to  ask  from  every  one ;  and  by  not  knowing  how  the 
world  went  in  his  absence,  he  would  be  at  a  loss  to  know 
how  it  ought  to  go  on  when  he  recovered,  or  rather,  returned 
to  it  again.  In  like  manner,  though  in  a  less  degree,  a  too 
great  inattention  to  past  occurrences  retards  and  bewilders 
oui  judgment  in  every  thing ;  while,  on  the  contrary,  by 
comparing  what  is  past  with  what  is  present,  we  frequently 
hit  on  the  true  character  of  both,  and  become  wise  with 
very  little  trouble.  It  is  a  kind  of  counter-march,  by  which 
we  get  into  the  rear  of  time,  and  mark  the  movements  and 
meaning  of  things  as  we  make  our  return.  There  are  cer- 
tain circumstances,  which,  at  the  time  of  their  happening, 
are  a  kind  of  riddles,  and  as  every  riddle  is  to  be  followed 
by  its  answer,  so  those  kind  of  circumstances  will  be  fol- 
lowed by  their  events,  and  those  events  are  always  the  true 
solution.  A  considerable  space  of  time  may  lapse  between, 
and  unless  we  continue  our  observations  from  the  one  to  the 
other,  the  harmony  of  them  will  pass  away  unnoticed :  but 
the  misfortune  is,  that  partly  from  the  pressing  necessity  of 
some  instant  things,  and  partly  from  the  impatience  of  our 
own  tempers,  we  are  frequently  in  such  a  hurry  to  make  out 
the  meaning  of  every  thing  as  fast  as  it  happens,  that  we 
thereby  never  truly  understand  it ;  and  not  only  start  new 
difficulties  to  ourselves  by  so  doing,  but,  as  it  were,  embarrass 
Providence  in  her  good  designs. 

I  have  been  civil  in  stating  this  fault  on  a  large  scale,  for, 
as  it  now  stands,  it  dues  not  appear  to  be  levelled  against 
any  particular  set  of  men ;  but  were  it  to  be  refined  a  little 
further,  it  might  afterwards  be  applied  to  the  tories  with  a 


THE   CRISIS.  27 

degree  of  striking  propriety :  those  men  have  been  remark- 
able for  drawing  sudden  conclusions  from  single  facts.  The 
least  apparent  mishap  on  our  side,  or  the  least  seeming  advan- 
tage on  the  part  of  the  enemy,  have  determined  with  them 
the  fate  of  a  whole  campaign.  By  this  hasty  judgment 
they  have  converted  a  retreat  into  a  defeat ;  mistook  gene- 
ralship for  error;  while  every  little  advantage  purposely 
given  the  enemy,  either  to  weaken  their  strength ^by  divid- 
ing it,  embarrass  their  councils  by  multiplying  their  objects, 
or  to  secure  a  greater  post  by  the  surrender  of  a  less,  has 
been  instantly  magnified  into  a  conquest.  Thus,  by  quarter- 
ing ill  policy  upon  ill  principles,  they  have  frequently  pro- 
moted the  cause  they  have  designed  to  injure,  and  injured 
that  which  they  intended  to  promote.  It  is  probable  the 
campaign  may  open  before  this  number  comes  from  the 
press.  The  enemy  have  long  lain  idle,  and  amused  them- 
selves with  carrying  on  the  war  by  proclamations  only. 
AVTiile  they  continue  their  delay  our  strength  increases,  and 
were  they  to  move  to  action  now,  it  is  a  circumstantial 
proof  that  they  have  no  reinforcement  coming ;  wherefore, 
in  either  case,  the  comparative  advantage  will  be  ours. 
Like  a  wounded,  disabled  whale,  they  want  only  tune  and 
room  to  die  in ;  and  though  in  the  agony  of  their  exit,  it 
may  be  unsafe  to  live  within  the  flapping  of  their  tail,  yet 
every  hour  shortens  their  date,  and  lessens  their  power  of 
miscnief.  If  any  thing  happens  while  this  number  is  in  the 
press,  it  will  afford  me  a  subject  for  the  last  pages  of  it. 
At  present  I  am  tired  of  waiting ;  and  as  neither  the  enemy, 
nor  the  state  of  politics  have  yet  produced  any  thing  new,  I 
am  thereby  left  in  the  field  of  general  matter,  undirected  by 
any  striking  or  particular  object.  This  Crisis,  therefore,  will 
be  made  up  rather  of  variety  than  novelty,  and  consist  more 
of  things  useful  than  things  wonderful. 

The  success  of  the  cause,  the  union  of  the  people,  and 
the  means  of  supporting  and  securing  both,  are  points 
which  cannot  be  too  much  attended  to.  He  who  doubts  of 
the  former  is  a  desponding  coward,  and  he  who  wilfully 
disturbs  the  latter  is  a  traitor.  Their  characters  are  easily 
fixed,  and  under  these  short  descriptions  I  leave  them  foi 
the  present. 

One  of  the  greatest  degrees  of  sentimental  union  which 
America  ever  knew,  was  m  denying  the  right  of  the  British 
parliament  "  to  bind  the  colonies  in  all  cases  whatsoever." 
The  declaration  is,  in  its  form,  an  almighty  one,  and  is  the 


28  THE   CRISIS 

loftiest  stretch  of  arbitrary  power  that  ever  one  set  of  men, 
or  one  country  claimed  ov  er  another.  Taxation  was  nothing 
more  than  the  putting  the  declared  right  into  practice  ;  and 
this  failing,  recourse  was  had  to  arms,  as  a  means  to  estab- 
lish both  the  right  and  the  practice,  or  to  answer  a  worse 
purpose,  which  will  be  mentioned  in  the  course  of  this  num- 
ber. And  in  order  to  repay  themselves  the  expense  of  an 
army,  and  to  profit  by  their  own  injustice,  the  colonies 
were,  by  another  law,  declared  to  be  in  a  state  of  actual  re- 
bellion, and  of  consequence  all  property  therein  would  fall 
to  the  conquerors. 

The  colonies,  on  their  part,  first,  denied  the  right ;  se- 
condly, they  suspended  the  use  of  taxable  articles,  and  pe- 
titioned against  the  practice  of  taxation  :  and  these  failing, 
they,  thirdly,  defended  their  property  by  force,  as  soon  as  it 
was  forcibly  invaded,  and  in  answer  to  the  declaration  of 
rebellion  and  non-protection,  published  their  declaration  of 
independence  and  right  of  self-protection. 

These,  in  a  few  words,  are  the  different  stages  of  the 
quarrel;  and  the  parts  are  so  intimately  and  necessarily 
connected  with  each  other  as  to  admit  of  no  separation.  A 
person,  to  use  a  trite  phrase,  must  be  a  whig  or  a  tory  in  the 
lump.  His  feelings,  as  a  man,  may  be  wounded ;  his 
charity,  as  a  Christian,  may  be  moved ;  but  his  political 
principles  must  go  through  all  the  cases  on  one  side  or  the 
other.  He  cannot  be  a  whig  in  this  stage,  and  a  tory  in 
that.  If  he  says  he  is  against  the  united  independence  of 
the  continent,  he  is  to  all  intents  and  purposes  against  her 
in  all  the  rest ;  because  this  last  comprehends  the  whole. 
And  he  may  just  ao  well  say,  that  Britain  was  right  in  de- 
claring us  rebels ;  right  in  taxing  us  ;  and  right  in  declaring 
her  "  right  to  bind  the  colonies  in  all  cases  whatsoever"  It 
signifies  nothing  what  neutral  ground,  of  his  own  creating, 
he  may  skulk  upon  for  shelter,  for  the  quarrel  in  no  stage 
of  it  hath  afforded  any  such  ground ;  and  either  we  or  Bri- 
tain are  absolutely  right  or  absolutely  wrong  through  the 
whole. 

Britain,  like  a  gamester  nearly  ruined,  hath  now  put  all 
her  losses  into  one  bet,  and  is  playing  a  desperate  game  for 
the  total.  If  she  wins  it,  she  wins  from  me  my  Hfe ;  she 
wins  the  continent  as  the  forfeited  property  of  rebels ;  the 
right  of  taxing  those  that  are  left  as  reducea  subjects  ;  and 
the  power  of  binding  them  slaves ;  and  the  single  die  which 
determines  this  unparalleled  event  is,  whether  \ve  support 


THE   CRISIS.  29 

our  independence  or  she  overturn  it.  This  is  coming  to  the 
point  at  once.  Here  is  the  touchstone  to  try  men  by.  He 
that  is  not  a  supporter  of  the  independent  states  of  America, 
in  the  same  decree  that  Ms  religious  and  political  principles 
would  suffer  him  to  support  the  government  of  any  other 
country,  of  which  he  called  himself  a  subject,  is,  in  the 
American  sense  of  the  word,  A  TORY  ;  and  the  instant  that 
he  endeavors  to  bring  his  toryism  into  practice,  he  'becomes  A 
TRAITOR.  The  first  can  only  be  detected  by  a  general  test, 
and  the  law  hath  already  provided  for  the  latter. 

It  is  unnatural  and  impolitic  to  admit  men  who  would 
root  up  our  independence  to  have  any  share  in  our  legisla- 
tion, either  as  electors  or  representatives  ;  because  the  sup- 
port of  our  independence  rests,  in  a  great  measure,  on  the 
vigor  and  purity  of  our  public  bodies.  Would  Britain,  even 
in  time  of  peace,  much  less  in  war,  suffer  an  election  to  be 
carried  by  men  who  professed  themselves  to  be  not  her  sub- 
jects, or  allow  such  to  sit  in  parliament?  Certainly  not. 

But  there  are  a  certain  species  of  tories  with  whom  con- 
science or  principle  hath  nothing  to  do,  and  who  are  so 
from  avarice  only.  Some  of  the  first  fortunes  on  the  con- 
tinent, on  the  part  of  the  whigs,  are  staked  on  the  issue  of 
our  present  measures.  And  shall  disaffection  only  be  re- 
warded with  security  ?  Can  any  thing  be  a  greater  induce- 
ment to  a  miserly  man,  than  the  hope  of  making  his  mam- 
mon safe  ?  And  though  the  scheme  be  fraught  with  every 
character  of  folly,  yet,  so  long  as  he  supposes,  that  by  doing 
nothing  materially  criminal  against  America  on  one  part, 
and  by  expressing  his  private  disapprobation  against  inde- 
pendence, as  palliative  with  the  enemy  on  the  other  part, 
he  stands  in  a  safe  line  between  both ;  while,  I  say,  this 
ground  be  suffered  to  remain,  craft,  and  the  spirit  of  avarice, 
will  point  it  out,  and  men  will  not  be  wanting  to  fill  up  this 
most  contemptible  of  all  characters. 

These  men,  ashamed  to  own  the  sordid  cause  from  whence 
their  disaffection  springs,  add  thereby  meanness  to  mean- 
ness, by  endeavoring  to  shelter  themselves  under  the  mask 
of  hypocrisy  ;  that  is,  they  had  rather  be  thought  to  be  tories 
from  soms.  kind  of  principle,  than  tories  by  having  no  prin- 
ciples at  all.  But  till  such  time  as  they  can  show  some  real 
reason,  natural,  political,  or  conscientious,  on  which  their 
objections  to  independence  are  founded,  we  are  not  obliged 
to  give  them  credit  for  being  tories  of  the  first  stamp,  but 
must  set  them  dowm  as  tories  of  the  last. 


30  THE    CRISIS. 

In  the  second  mimber  of  the  Crisis,  I  endeavored  to  show 
the  impossibility  of  the  enemy's  making  any  conquest  of 
America,  that  nothing  was  wanting  on  our  part  but  patience 
and  perseverance,  and  that,  with  these  virtues,  our  success, 
as  far  as  human  speculation  could  discern,  seemed  as  certain 
as  fate.  But  as  there  are  many  among  us,  who,  influenced  by 
others,  have  regularly  gone  back  from  the  principles  they 
once  held,  in  proportion  as  we  have  gone  forward ;  and  as 
it  is  the  unfortunate  lot  of  many  a  good  man  to  live  within 
the  neighborhood  of  disaffected  ones  ;  I  shall,  therefore,  for 
the  sake  of  confirming  the  one  and  recovering  the  other, 
endeavor,  in  the  space  of  a  page  or  two,  to  go  over  some  of 
the  leading  principles  in  support  of  independence.  It  is  a 
much  pleasanter  task  to  prevent  vice  than  to  punish  it,  and, 
however  our  tempers  may  be  gratified  by  resentment,  or  our 
national  expenses  be  eased  by  forfeited  estates,  harmony  and 
friendship  is,  nevertheless,  the  happiest  condition  a  country 
can  be  blest  with. 

The  principal  arguments  in  support  of  independence  may 
be  comprehended  under  the  four  following  heads. 

1st,  The  natural  right  of  the  continent  to  independence. 

2d,  Her  interest  in  being  independent. 

3d,  The  necessity, — and 

4th,  The  moral  advantages  arising  therefrom. 

1st,  The  natural  right  of  the  continent  to  independence,  is 
a  point  which  never  yet  was  called  in  question.  It  will  not 
even  admit  of  a  debate.  To  deny  such  a  right,  would  be  a 
kind  of  atheism  against  nature  :  and  the  best  answer  to  such 
an  objection  would  be,  "  The  fool  hath  said  in  his  heart 
there  ^s  no  God." 

2d,  The  interest  of  the  continent  in  being  independent  is 
a  point  as  clearly  right  as  the  former.  America,  by  her  own 
internal  industry,  and  unknown  to  all  the  powers  of  Europe, 
was,  at  the  beginning  of  the  dispute,  arrived  at  a  pitch  of 
greatness,  trade  and  population,  beyond  which  it  was  the 
interest  of  Britain  not  to  suffer  her  to  pass,  lest  she  should 
grow  too  powerful  to  be  kept  subordinate.  She  began  to 
view  this  country  with  the  same  uneasy  malicious  eye,  with 
which  a  covetous  guardian  would  view  his  ward,  whose 
estate  he  had  been  enriching  himself  by  for  twenty  years, 
and  saw  him  just  arriving  at  manhood.  And  America  owes 
no  more  to  Britain  for  her  present  maturity,  than  the  ward 
would  to  the  guardian  for  being  twenty-one  years  of  age. 
That  America  hath  flourished  at  the  time  she  was  under  the 


THE   CBI8I8.  31 

government  of  Britain,  is  true ;  but  there  is  every  natural 
reason  to  believe,  that  had  she  been  an  independent  country 
from  the  first  settlement  thereof,  uncontrolled  by  any  foreign 
power,  free  to  make  her  own  laws,  regulate  and  encourage 
her  own  commerce,  she  had  by  this  time  been  of  much 
greater  worth  than  now.  The  case  is  simply  this  :  the  first 
settlers  in  the  different  colonies  were  left  to  shift  for  them- 
selves, unnoticed  and  unsupported  by  any  European  govern- 
ment :  but  as  the  tyranny  and  persecution  of  tne  old 
world  daily  drove  numbers  to  the  new,  and  as,  by  the  favor 
of  heaven  on  their  industry  and  perseverance,  they  grew 
into  importance,  so,  in  a  like  degree,  they  became  an  object 
of  profit  to  the  greedy  eyes  of  Europe.  It  was  impossible, 
in  this  state  of  infancy,  however  thriving  and  promising,  that 
they  could  resist  the  power  of  any  armed  invader  that  should 
seek  to  bring  them  under  his  authority.  In  this  situation, 
Britain  thought  it  worth  her  while  to  claim  them,  and  the 
continent  received  and  acknowledged  the  claimer.  It  was, 
in  reality,  of  no  very  great  importance  who  was  her  master, 
seeing,  that  from  the  force  and  ambition  of  the  different 
powers  of  Europe,  she  must,  till  she  acquired  strength  enough 
to  assert  her  own  right,  acknowledge  some  one.  As  well, 
perhaps,  Britain  as  another  ;  and  it  might  have  been  as  well 
to  have  been  under  the  states  of  Holland  as  any.  The  same 
hopes  of  engrossing  and  profiting  by  her  trade,  by  not 
oppressing  it  too  much,  would  have  operated  alike  with 
any  master,  and  produced  to  the  colonies  the  same  effects. 
The  clamor  of  protection,  likewise,  was  all  a  farce  ;  because, 
in  order  to  make  that  protection  necessary,  she  must  first, 
by  her  own  quarrels,  create  us  enemies.  Hard  times  indeed ! 
To  know  whether  it  be  the  interest  of  the  continent  to  be 
independent,  we  need  only  ask  this  easv,  simple  question : 
Is  it  the  interest  of  a  man  to  be  a  boy  all  his  life  ?  The  an- 
swer to  one  will  be  the  answer  to  both.  America  hath  been 
one  continued  scene  of  legislative  contention  from  the  first 
king's  representative  to  the  last ;  and  this  was  unavoidably 
founded  in  the  natural  opposition  of  interest  between  the  old 
country  and  the  new.  A  governor  sent  from  England,  or 
receiving  his  authority  therefrom,  ought  never  to  have  been 
considered  in  any  other  light  than  that  of  a  genteel  commis- 
sioned spy,  whose  private  business  was  information,  and  his 
public  business  a  kind  of  civilized  oppression.  In  the  first  of 
these  characters  he  was  to  watch  the  tempers,  sentiments 
and  dispositions  of  the  people,  the  growth  of  trade,  and  the 


82  THE   CRISIS. 

increase  of  private  fortunes;  and,  in  the  latter,  to  suppress 
all  such  acts  of  the  assemblies,  however  beneficial  to  the 
people,  which  did  not  directly  or  indirectly,  throw  some 
increase  of  power  or  profit  into  the  hands  of  those  that 
sent  him. 

America,  till  now,  could  never  be  called  a  free  country, 
because  her  legislation  depended  on  the  will  of  a  man  three 
thousand  miles  distant,  whose  interest  was  in  opposition  to 
ours,  and  who,  by  a  single  "  no,"  could  forbid  what  law  he 
pleased. 

The  freedom  of  trade,  likewise,  is,  to  a  trading  country, 
an  article  of  such  importance,  that  the  principal  source  of 
wealth  depends  upon  it ;  and  it  is  impossible  that  any  country 
can  flourish,  as  it  otherwise  might  do,  whose  commerce  is 
engrossed,  cramped  and  fettered  by  the  laws  and  mandates 
of  another — yet  these  evils,  and  more  than  I  can  here  enu- 
merate, the  continent  has  suffered  by  being  under  the  gov- 
ernment of  England.  By  an  independence  we  clear  the 
whole  at  once — put  an  end  to  the  business  of  unanswered 
petitions  and  fruitless  remonstrances — exchange  Britain  for 
Europe — shake  hands  with  the  world — live  at  peace  with 
the  world — and  trade  to  any  market  where  we  can  buy 
and  sell. 

3d,  The  necessity,  likewise,  of  being  independent,  even 
before  it  was  declared,  became  so  evident  and  important, 
that  the  continent  ran  the  risk  of  being  ruined  every  day 
that  she  delayed  it.  There  was  reason  to  believe  that  Bri- 
tain would  endeavour  to  make  an  European  matter  of  it, 
and,  rather  than  lose  the  whole,  would  dismember  it,  like 
Poland,  and  dispose  of  her  several  claims  to  the  highest  bid- 
der. Genoa,  failing  in  her  attempts  to  reduce  Corsica,  made 
a  sale  of  it  to  the  French,  and  such  traffics  have  been  com- 
mon in  the  old  world.  We  had  at  that  time  no  ambassador 
in  any  part  of  Europe,  to  counteract  her  negociations,  and 
by  that  means  she  had  the  range  of  every  foreign  court  un- 
contradicted  on  our  part.  We  even  knew  nothing  of  the 
treaty  for  the  Hessians  till  it  was  concluded,  and  the  troops 
ready  to  embark.  Had  we  been  independent  before,  we  had 
probably  prevented  her  obtaining  them.  We  had  no  credit 
abroad,  because  of  our  rebellious  dependency.  Our  ships 
could  claim  no  protection  in  foreign  courts,  because  we  af- 
forded them  no  justifiable  reason  for  granting  it  to  us.  The 
calling  ourselves  subjects,  and  at  the  same  time  fighting 
against  the  power  which  we  acknowledged,  was  a  dangerous 


THE   CRISIS.  33 

precedent  to  all  Europe.  If  the  grievances  justified  the  tak- 
ing up  arms,  they  justified  our  separation  ;  if  they  did  not 
justify  our  separation,  neither  could  they  justify  our  taking 
up  arms.  All  Europe  was  interested  in  reducing  us  as  rebels, 
and  all  Europe  (or  the  greatest  part  at  least)  is  interested  in 
supporting  us  as  independent  states.  At  home  our  condition 
was  still  worse ;  our  currency  had  no  foundation,  and  the 
fall  of  it  would  have  ruined  whig  and  tory  alike.  We  had 
no  other  law  than  a  kind  of  moderated  passion ;  no  other 
civil  power  than  an  honest  mob ;  and  no  other  protection 
than  the  temporary  attachment  of  one  man  to  another.  Had 
independence  been  delayed  a  few  months  longer,  this  conti 
nent  would  have  been  plunged  into  irrecoverable  confusion : 
some  violent  for  it,  some  against  it,  till,  in  the  general  cabal, 
the  rich  would  have  been  ruined,  and  the  poor  destroyed.  It 
is  to  independence  that  every  tory  owes  the  present  safety 
which  he  lives  in ;  for  by  that,  and  that  only,  we  emerged 
from  a  state  of  dangerous  suspense,  and  became  a  regular 
people. 

The  necessity,  likewise,  of  being  independent,  had  there 
been  no  rupture  between  Britain  and  America,  would,  in  a 
little  time,  have  brought  one  on.  The  increasing  importance 
of  commerce,  the  weight  and  perplexity  of  legislation,  and 
the  entangled  state  of  European  politics,  would  daily  have 
shown  to  the  continent  the  impossibility  of  continuing  sub- 
ordinate ;  for,  after  the  coolest  reflections  on  the  matter,  this 
•must  be  allowed,  that  Britain  was  too  jealous  of  America  to 
govern  it  justly  ;  too  ignorant  of  it  to  govern  it  well ;  and 
too  far  distant  from  it  to  govern  it  at  all. 

4th.  But  what  weigh  most  with  all  men  of  serious  reflec- 
tion are,  the  moral  advantages  arising  from  independence : 
war  and  desolation  have  become  the  trade  of  the  old  world ; 
and  America  neither  could,  nor  can  be  under  the  govern- 
ment of  Britain  without  becoming  a  sharer  of  her  guilt,  and 
a  partner  in  all  the  dismal  commerce  of  death.  The  spirit 
of  duelling,  extended  on  a  national  scale,  is  a  proper  charac- 
ter for  European  wars.  They  have  seldom  any  other  motive 
than  pride,  or  any  other  object  than  fame.  The  conquerors 
and  the  conquered  are  generally  ruined  alike,  and  the  chief 
difference  at  last  is,  that  the  one  marches  home  with  his 
honors,  and  the  other  without  them.  "lis  the  natural  tem- 
per of  the  English  to  fight  for  a  feather,  if  they  suppose  that 
feather  to  be  an  affront ;  and  America,  without  the  right 
of  asking  why,  must  have  abetted  in  every  quarrel,  and 


34  THE   OBI8I8. 

abided  by  its  fate  It  is  a  shocking  situation  to  live  in,  that 
one  country  must  be  brought  into  all  the  wars  of  another, 
whether  the  measure  be  right  or  wrong,  or  whether  she  will 
or  not ;  yet  this,  in  the  fullest  extent,  was,  and  ever  would 
be,  the  unavoidable  consequence  of  the  connexion.  Surely 
the  Quakers  forgot  their  own  principles,  when,  in  their  late 
Testimony,  they  called  this  connexion,  with  these  military 
and  miserable  appendages  hanging  to  it — "  the  happy  con- 
stitution" 

Britain,  for  centuries  past,  has  been  nearly  fifty  years  out 
of  every  hundred  at  war  with  some  power  or  other.  It  cer- 
tainly ought  to  be  a  conscientious  as  well  as  political  con- 
sideration with  America,  not  to  dip  her  hands  in  the  bloody 
work  of  Europe.  Our  situation  affords  us  a  retreat  from 
their  cabals,  and  the  present  happy  union  of  the  states  bids 
fair  for  extirpating  the  future  use  of  arms  from  one  quarter 
of  the  world ;  yet  such  have  been  the  irreligious  politics  of 
the  present  leaders  of  the  Quakers,  that,  for  the  sake  of  they 
scarce  know  what,  they  would  cut  off  every  hope  of  such  a 
blessing  by  tying  this  continent  to  Britain,  like  Hector  to 
the  chariot  wheel  of  Achilles,  to  be  dragged  through  all  the 
miseries  of  endless  European  wars. 

The  connexion,  viewed  from  this  ground,  is  distressing  to 
every  man  who  has  the  feelings  of  humanity.  By  having 
Britain  for  our  master,  we  became  enemies  to  the  greatest 
part  of  Europe,  and  they  to  us  :  and  the  consequence  was 
war  inevitable.  By  being  our  own  masters,  independent  of 
any  foreign  one,  we  have  Europe  for  our  friends,  and  the 
prospect  of  an  endless  peace  among  ourselves.  Those  who 
were  advocates  for  the  British  government  over  these  colo- 
nies, were  obliged  to  limit  both  their  arguments  and  their 
ideas  to  the  period  of  an  European  peace  only  :  the  moment 
Britain  became  plunged  in  war,  every  supposed  convenience 
to  us  vanished,  and  all  we  could  hope  for  was  not  to  be  ru- 
ined. Could  this  be  a  desirable  condition  for  a  young  coun- 
try to  be  in  ? 

Had  the  French  pursued  their  fortune  immediately  after 
the  defeat  of  Braddock  last  war,  this  city  and  province  had 
then  experienced  the  woful  calamities  of  being  a  British  sub- 
ject. A  scene  of  the  same  kind  might  happen  again  ;  for 
America,  considered  as  a  subject  to  the  crown  of  Britain, 
would  ever  have  been  the  seat  of  war,  and  the  bone  of  con- 
tention between  the  two  powers. 

On  the  whole,  if  the  future  expulsion  of  arms  from  one 


THE    CBI8I8.  3ft 

Barter  of  the  world  would  be  a  desirable  object  to  a  peace- 
able man  ; — if  the  freedom  of  trade  to  every  part  of  it  can 
engage  the  attention  of  a  man  of  business ; — if  the  support 
or  fall  of  millions  of  currency  can  affect  our  interests ; — if 
the  entire  possession  of  estates,  by  cutting  off  the  lordly 
claims  of  Britain  over  the  soil,  deserves  the  regard  of  landed 
property ;  and  if  the  right  of  making  our  own  laws,  uncon- 
trolled by  royal  or  ministerial  spies  or  mandates,  be  worthy 
our  care  as  freemen ; — then  are  all  men  interested  in  the 
support  of  independence ;  and  may  he  that  supports  it  not, 
be  driven  from  the  blessing,  and  live  unpitied  beneath  the 
servile  suffering  of  scandalous  subjection ! 

We  have  been  amused  with  the  tales  of  ancient  wonders ; 
we  have  read,  and  wept  over  the  histories  of  other  nations  ; 
applauded,  censured,  or  pitied,  as  their  cases  affected  us. 
The  fortitude  and  patience  of  the  sufferers — the  justness  of 
their  cause — the  weight  of  their  oppressions  and  oppressors 
— the  object  to  be  saved  or  lost — with  all  the  consequences 
of  a  defeat  or  a  conquest — have,  in  the  hour  of  sympathy, 
bewitched  our  hearts,  and  chained  it  to  their  fate :  but 
where  is  the  power  that  ever  made  war  upon  petitioners  ? 
Or  where  is  the  war  on  which  a  world  was  staked  till  now  ? 

We  may  not,  perhaps,  be  wise  enough  to  make  all  the 
advantages  we  ought  of  our  independence;  but  they  are, 
nevertheless,  marked  and  presented  to  us  with  every  charac- 
ter of  great  and  good,  and  worthy  the  hand  of  him  who  sent 
them.  I  look  through  the  present  trouble  to  a  time  of  tran- 
quillity, when  we  shall  have  it  in  our  power  to  set  an 
example  of  peace  to  all  the  world.  Were  the  Quakers 
really  impressed  and  influenced  by  the  quiet  principles  the} 
profess  to  hold,  they  would,  however  they  might  disapprove 
the  means,  be  the  first  of  all  men  to  approve  of  independence, 
because,  by  separating  ourselves  from  the  cities  of  Sodom 
and  Gomorrah,  it  affords  an  opportunity  never  given  to 
man  before,  of  carrying  their  favorite  principle  of  peace 
into  general  practice,  by  establishing  governments  that 
shall  hereafter  exist  without  wars.  O I  ye  fallen,  cringing, 
priest  and  Pemberton-ridden  people !  What  more  can  we 
say  of  ve  then  that  a  religious  Quaker  is  a  valuable  charac- 
ter, and  a  political  Quaker  a  real  Jesuit. 

Having  thus  gone  over  some  of  the  principal  points  in 
support  of  independence,  I  must  now  request  the  reader  to 
return  back  witn  me  to  the  period  when  it  first  began  to  be 
a  public  doctrine,  and  to  examine  the  progress  it  nas  made 


36  THE   CRISIS. 

among  the  various  classes  of  men.  The  era  I  mean  to  begin 
at,  is  the  breaking  out  of  hostilities,  April  19th,  1775.  Until 
this  event  happened,  the  continent  seemed  to  view  the  dis- 
pute as  a  kind  of  law-suit  for  a  matter  of  right,  litigating 
between  the  old  country  and  the  new  ;  and  she  felt  the 
same  kind  and  degree  of  horror,  as  if  she  had  seen  an  op- 
pressive plaintiff,  at  the  head  of  a  band  of  ruffians,  enter  the 
court,  while  the  cause  was  before  it,  and  put  the  judge,  the 
jury,  the  defendant  and  his  counsel,  to  the  sword.  Perhaps 
a  more  heart-felt  convulsion  never  reached  the  country  with 
the  same  degree  of  power  and  rapidity  before,  and  never 
may  again.  Pity  for  the  sufferers,  mixed  with  indignation 
at  the  violence,  and  heightened  with  apprehensions  of  un- 
dergoing the  same  fate,  made  the  affair  of  Lexington  the 
affair  of  the  continent.  Every  part  of  it  felt  the  shock,  and 
all  vibrated  together.  A  general  promotion  of  sentiment 
took  place :  those  who  had  drank  deeply  into  whiggish 
principles,  that  is,  the  right  and  necessity  not  only  of  op- 
posing, but  wholly  setting  aside  the  power  of  the  crown  as 
soon  as  it  became  practically  dangerous  (for  in  theory  it  was 
always  so)  stepped  into  the  first  stage  of  independence  ;  while 
another  class  of  whigs,  equally  sound  in  principle,  but  not 
so  sanguine  in  enterprise,  attached  themselves  the  stronger 
to  the  cause,  and  fell  close  in  with  the  rear  of  the  former ; 
their  partition  was  a  mere  point.  Numbers  of  the  moderate 
men,  whose  chief  fault,  at  that  time,  arose  from  their  enter- 
taining a  better  opinion  of  Britain  than  she  deserved,  con- 
vinced now  of  their  mistake,  gave  her  up,  and  publicly  de- 
clared themselves  good  whigs.  While  the  tories,  seeing  it 
was  no  longer  a  laughing  matter,  either  sunk  into  silent 
obscurity,  or  contented  themselves  with  coming  forth  and 
abusing  general  Gage :  not  a  single  advocate  appeared  to 
justify  the  action  of  that  day ;  it  seemed  to  appear  to  every 
one  with  the  same  magnitude,  struck  every  one  with  the 
same  force,  and  created  in  every  one  the  same  abhorrence. 
From  this  period  we  may  date  the  growth  of  independence. 
If  the  many  circumstances  which  happened  at  this  me- 
morable time,  be  taken  in  one  view,  and  compared  with 
each  other,  they  will  justify  a  conclusion  which  seems  not 
to  have  been  attended  to,  I  mean  a  fixed  design  in  the  king 
and  ministry  of  driving  America  into  arms,  in  order  that 
they  might  be  furnished  with  a  pretence  for  seizing  the 
whole  continent,  as  the  immediate  property  of  the  crown. 
A.  noble  plunder  for  hungry  courtiers  1 


THE   CRISIS.  37 

It  ought  to  be  remembered  that  the  first  petition  from  the 
congress  was  at  this  time  unanswered  on  the  part  of  the 
British  king.  That  the  motion,  called  Lord  North's  motion, 
of  the  20th  February,  1775,  arrived  in  America  the  latter 
end  of  March.  This  motion  was  to  be  laid  by  the  several 
governors,  then  in  being,  before  the  assembly  of  each  pro- 
vince ;  and  the  first  assembly  before  which  it  was  laid,  ivas 
the  assembly  of  Pennsylvania,  in  May  following.  This 
being  a  just  state  of  the  case,  I  then  ask,  why  were  hostilities 
commenced  between  the  time  of  passing  the  resolve  in  thf 
house  of  commons,  of  the  20th  of  February,  and  the  time  of 
the  assemblies  meeting  to  deliberate  upon  it?  Degrading 
and  infamous  as  that  motion  was,  there  is,  nevertheless, 
reason  to  believe  that  the  king  and  his  adherents  were  afraid 
the  colonies  would  agree  to  it,  and  lest  they  should,'  took 
effectual  care  they  should  not,  by  provoking  them  with  hos- 
tilities in  the  interim.  They  had  not  the  least  doubt  at  that 
time  of  conquering  America  at  one  blow ;  and  what  they 
expected  to  get  by  a  conquest  being  infinitely  greater  than 
any  thing  they  could  hope  get  either  by  taxation  or  accom- 
modation, they  seemed  determined  to  prevent  even  the  pos- 
sibility of  hearing  each  other,  lest  America  should  disap- 
point their  greedy  hopes  of  the  whole,  by  listening  even  to 
their  own  terms.  On  the  one  hand  they  refused  to  hear  the 
petition  of  the  continent,  and  on  the  other  hand  took  effec- 
tual care  the  continent  should  not  hear  them. 

That  the  motion  of  the  20th  of  February  and  the  orders 
for  commencing  hostilities  were  both  concerted  by  the  same 
person  or  persons,  and  not  the  latter  by  general  Gage,  as 
was  falsely  imagined  at  first,  is  evident  from  an  extract  of  a 
letter  of  his  to  the  administration,  read  among  other  papers 
in  the  house  of  commons ;  in  which  he  informs  his  masters, 
"  That  though  their  idea  of  his  disarming  certain  counties 
was  a  right  one,  yet  it  required  him  to  be  master  of  the 
country,  in  order  to  enable  him.  to  execute  it"  This  was  prior 
to  the  commencement  of  hostilities,  and  consequently  before 
the  motion  of  the  20th  February  could  be  deliberated  on  by 
the  several  assemblies. 

Perhaps  it  may  be  asked,  why  was  the  motion  passed,  if 
there  was  at  the  same  time  a%  plan  to  aggravate  the  Ameri- 
cans not  to  listen  to  it  ?  Lord  North  assigned  one  reason 
himself,  which  was  a  hope  of  dividing  them.  This  was  pub- 
licly tempting  them  to  reject  it;  that  if,  in  case  the  injury 
of  arms  should  fail  in  provoking  them  sufficiently,  the  insult 


38  THE   CRISIS. 

of  such  a  declaration  might  fill  it  up.  But  by  passing  the 
motion  and  getting  it  afterwards  rejected  in  America,  it 
enabled  them,  in  their  wretched  idea  of  politics,  among 
other  things,  to  hold  up  the  colonies  to  foreign  powers,  with 
every  possible  mark  of  disobedience  and  rebellion.  They 
had  applied  to  those  powers  not  to  supply  the  continent 
with  arms,  ammunition,  &c.  and  it  was  necessary  they 
should  incense  them  against  us,  by  assigning  on  their  own 
part  some  seeming  reputable  reason  why.  By  dividing,  it 
had  a  tendency  to  weaken  the  states,  and  likewise  to  per- 
plex the  adherents  of  America  in  England.  But  the  princi- 
pal scheme,  and  that  which  has  marked  their  character  in 
every  part  of  their  conduct,  was  a  design  of  precipitating 
the  colonies  into  a  state  which  they  might  afterwards  deem 
rebellion,  and,  under  that  pretence,  put  an  end  to  all  future 
complaints,  petitions  and  remonstrances,  by  seizing  the 
whole  at  once.  They  had  ravaged  one  part  of  the  globe, 
till  it  could  glut  them  no  longer ;  their  prodigality  required 
new  plunder,  and  through  the  East  India  article  tea  they 
hoped  to'  transfer  their  rapine  from  that  quarter  of  the  world 
to  this.  Every  designed  quarrel  had  its  pretence ;  and  the 
same  barbarian  avarice  accompanied  the  plant  to  America, 
which  ruined  the  country  that  produced  it. 

That  men  never  turn  rogues  without  turning  fools  is  a 
maxim,  sooner  or  later,  universally  true.  The  commence- 
ment of  hostilities,  being  in  the  beginning  of  April,  was,  of 
all  times  the  worst  chosen :  the  congress  were  to  meet  the 
tenth  of  May  following,  and  the  distress  the  continent  felt  at 
this  unparalleled  outrage  gave  a  stability  to  that  body,  which 
no  other  circumstance  could  have  done.  It  suppressed,  too, 
all  inferior  debates,  and  bound  them  together  by  a  necessi- 
tous affection,  without  giving  them  time  to  differ  upon 
trifles,  the  suffering,  likewise,  softened  the  whole  body  of 
the  people  into  a  degree  of  pliability,  which  laid  the  princi- 
pal foundation-stone  of  union,  order  and  government ;  and 
which,  at  any  other  time,  might  only  have  fretted  and  then 
faded  away  unnoticed  and  unimproved:  but  Providence, 
who  best  knows  how  to  time  her  misfortunes  as  well  as  her 
immediate  favors,  chose  this  to  be  the  time,  and  who  dare 
dispute  it? 

It  did  not  seem  the  disposition  of  the  people,  at  this  crisis, 
to  heap  petition  upon  petition,  while  the  former  remained 
unanswered  :  the  measure,  however,  was  carried  in  congress, 
and*a  second  petition  was  sent ;  of  which  I  shall  only  remark 


THE   CRISIS.  39 

that  it  was  submissive  even  to  a  dangerous  fault,  because  the 
prayer  of  it  appealed  solely  to  what  is  called  the  preroga- 
tive of  the  crown,  while  the  matter  in  dispute  was  confess- 
edly constitutional.  But  even  this  petition,  flattering  as  it 
was,  was  still  not  so  harmonious  as  the  chink  of  cash,  and 
consequently  not  sufficiently  grateful  to  the  tyrant  and  his 
ministry.  From  every  circumstance  it  is  evident,  that  it 
was  the  determination  of  the  British  court  to  have  nothing 
to  do  with  America  but  to  conquer  her  fully  and  absolutely. 
They  were  certain  of  success,  and  the  field  of  battle  was  the 
only  place  of  treaty.  I  am  confident  there  are  thousands 
and  tens  of  thousands  in  America  who  wonder  now  that 
they  should  ever  have  thought  otherwise ;  but  the  sin  of  that 
day  was  the  sin  of  civility,  yet  it  operated  against  our  present 
good  in  the  same  manner  that  a  civil  opinion  of  the  devil 
would  against  our  future  peace. 

Independence  was  a  doctrine  scarce  and  rare,  even  towards 
the  conclusion  of  the  year  1775 ;  all  our  politics  had  been 
founded  on  the  hope  or  expectation  of  making  the  matter  up — 
a  hope,  which,  though  general  on  the  side  of  America,  had 
never  entered  the  head  or  heart  of  the  British  court.  Their 
hope  was  conquest  and  confiscation.  Good  heavens  !  what 
volumes  of  thanks  does  America  owe  to  Britain?  What 
infinite  obligation  to  the  tool  that  fills,  with  paradoxical 
vacancy,  the  throne !  Nothing  but  the  sharpest  essence  of 
villany,  compounded  with  the  strongest  distillation  of  folly, 
could  nave  produced  a  menstruum  that  would  have  effected 
a  separation.  The  congress  in  1774,  administered  an  abortive 
medicine  to  independence,  by  prohibiting  the  importation  of 
goods,  and  the  succeeding  congress  rendered  the  dose  still 
more  dangerous  by  continuing  it.  Had  independence  been 
a  settled  system  with  America,  (as  Britain  has  advanced,) 
she  ought  to  have  doubled  her  importation,  and  prohibited 
in  some  degree  her  exportation.  And  this  single  circumstance 
is  sufficient  to  acquit  America  before  any  jury  of  nations,  of 
having  a  continental  plan  of  independence  in  view :  a  charge 
which,  had  it  been  true,  would  have  been  honorable,  but  is 
so  grossly  false,  that  either  the  amazing  ignorance  or  the 
wilful  dishonesty  of  the  British  court,  is  effectually  proved 
by  it. 

The  second  petition,  like  the  first,  produced  no  answer ; 
it  was  scarcely  acknowledged  to  have  been  received  ;  the 
British  court  were  too  determined  in  their  villainy  even  to 
act  it  artfully  and  in  their  rage  for  conquept  neglected  the 


40  THE   CBI8I8. 

necessary  subtleties  for  obtaining  it.  They  might  have 
divided,  distracted  and  played  a  thousand  tricks  with  as, 
had  they  been  as  cunning  as  they  were  cruel. 

This  last  indignity  gave  a  new  spring  to  independence. 
Those  who  knew  the  savage  obstinacy  of  the  king,  and  the 
jobbing,  gambling  spirit  of  the  court,  predicted  the  fate  of 
the  petition,  as  soon  as  it  was  sent  from  America  ;  for  the 
men  being  known,  their  measures  were  easily  foreseen.  As 
politicians  we  ought  not  so  much  to  ground  our  hopes  on  the 
reasonableness  of  the  thing  we  ask,  as  on  the  reasonableness  of 
the  person  of  whom  we  ask  it ;  who  would  expect  discretion 
from  a  fool,  candor  from  a  tyrant,  or  justice  from  a  villain  ? 

As  every  prospect  of  accommodation  seemed  now  to  fail 
fast,  men  began  to  think  seriously  on  the  matter ;  and  their 
reason  being  thus  stripped  of  the  false  hope  which  had  long 
encompassed  it,  became  approachable  by  fair  debate ;  yet 
still  the  bulk  of  the  people  hesitated ;  they  startled  at  the 
novelty  of  independence,  without  once  considering  that  our 
getting  into  arms  at  first  was  a  more  extraordinary  novelty, 
and  that  all  other  nations  had  gone  through  the  work  of 
independence  before  us.  They  doubted  likewise  the  ability 
of  the  continent  to  support  it,  without  reflecting  that  it 
required  the  same  force  to  obtain  an  accommodation  by 
arms  as  an  independence.  If  the  one  was  acquirable,  the 
other  was  the  same ;  because,  to  accomplish  either,  it  wa& 
necessary  that  our  strength  should  be  too  great  for  Britain 
to  subdue ;  and  it  was  too  unreasonable  to  suppose,  that 
with  the  power  of  being  masters,  we  should  submit  to  be 
servants.*  Their  caution  at  this  time  was  exceedingly  mis- 

*  In  this  state  of  political  suspense  the  pamphlet  Common  Sense  made  its 
appearance,  and  the  success  it  met  with  does  not  become  me  to  mention.  Dr. 
Franklin,  Mr.  Samuel  and  John  Adams,  were  severally  spoken  of  as  the 
supposed  author.  I  had  not,  at  that  time,  the  pleasure  either  of  personally 
knowing  or  being  known  to  the  two  last  gentlemen.  The  favor  of  Dr.  Frank- 
lin's friendship  I  possessed  in  England,  and  my  introduction  to  this  part  of  the 
world  was  through  his  patronage.  I  happened,  when  a  school-boy,  to  pick  up 
a  pleasing  natural  history  of  Virginia,  and  my  inclination  from  that  day  of 
seeing  the  western  side  of  the  Atlantic  never  left  me.  In  October,  1776,  Dr. 
Franklin  proposed  giving  me  such  materials  as  were  in  his  hands,  towards 
completing  a  history  of  the  present  transactions,  and  seemed  desirous  of 
having  the  first  volume  out  next  spring.  I  had  then  formed  the  outlines  of 
Common  Sense,  and  finished  nearly  the  first  part;  and  as  I  supposed  the 
do  'tor's  design  in  getting  out  a  history,  was  to  open  the  new  year  with  a  new 
system,  I  expected  to  surprise  him  with  a  production  on  that  subject,  much 
earlier  than  he  thought  of;  and  without  informing  him  what  I  was  doing,  got 
it  ready  for  the  press  as  fast  as  I  conveniently  could,  and  sent  him  the  firs* 
pamphlet  that  was  printed  off. 


THE    CRISIS. 


placed  ;  for  if  they  were  able  to  defend  their  property  and 
maintain  their  rights  by  arms,  they,  consequently,  were  able 
to  defend  and  support  their  independence  ;  and  in  proportion 
as  these  men  saw  the  necessity  and  correctness  of  the  measure, 
r,hey  honestly  and  openly  declared  and  adopted  it,  and  the 
part  that  they  have  acted  since,  has  done  them  honor  and 
fully  established  their  characters.  Error  in  opinion  has  this 
peculiar  advantage  with  it,  that  the  foremost  point  of  the 
contrary  ground  may  at  any  time  be  reached  by  the  sudden 
exertion  of  a  thought  ;  and  it  frequently  happens  in  senti- 
mental differences,  that  some  striking  circumstance,  or  some 
forcible  reason  quickly  conceived  will  effect  in  an  instant 
what  neither  argument  nor  example  could  produce  in  an  age. 

I  find  it  impossible  in  the  small  compass  I  am  limited  to, 
to  trace  out  the  progress  which  independence  has  made  on 
the  minds  of  the  different  classes  of  men,  and  the  several 
reasons  by  which  they  were  moved.  With  some,  it  was  a 
passionate  abhorrence  against  the  king  of  England  and  his 
ministry,  as  a  set  of  savages  and  brutes  ;  and  these  men, 
governed  by  the  agony  of  a  wounded  mind,  were  for  trust- 
ing every  thing  to  hope  and  heaven,  and  bidding  defiance  at 
once.  With  others,  it  was  a  growing  conviction  that  the 
scheme  of  the  British  court  was  to  create,  ferment,  and  drive 
on  a  quarrel,  for  the  sake  of  confiscated  plunder  ;  and  men 
of  this  class  ripened  into  independence  in  proportion  as  the 
evidence  increased.  While  a  third  class  conceived  it  was 
the  true  interest  of  America,  internally  and  externally,  to  be 
her  own  master,  and  gave  their  support  to  independence, 
step  by  step,  as  they  saw  her  abilities  to  maintain  it  enlarge. 
With  many,  it  was  a  compound  of  all  these  reasons  ;  while 
those  who  were  too  callous  to  be  reached  by  either,  remained, 
and  still  remain  tories. 

The  legal  necessity  of  being  independent,  with  several  col- 
lateral reasons,  is  pointed  out  in  an  elegant  masterly  manner, 
in  a  charge  to  the  grand  jury  for  the  district  of  Charleston, 
by  the  Hon.  William  Henry  Drayton,  Chief  Justice  of  South 
Carolina.  This  performance,  and  the  address  of  the  conven- 
tion of  New  York,  are  pieces,  in  my  humble  opinion,  of  the 
first  rank  in  America. 

The  principal  causes  why  independence  has  not  been  so 
universally  supported  as  it  ought,  &refear  and  indolence,  and 
the  causes  why  it  has  been  opposed,  are,  avarice,  down-right 
villainy,  and  lust  of  personal  power.  There  is  not  such  a 
being  in  America  as  a  tory  from  conscience  :  some  secret 


42  THE   CRISIS. 

defect  or  other  is  interwoven  in  the  character  of  all  those,  be 
they  men  or  women,  who  can  look  with  patience  on  the  brutal- 
ity, luxury  and  debauchery  of  the  British  court,  and  the  vio- 
lations of  their  army  here.  A  woman's  virtue  must  sit  very 
lightly  on  her  who  can  even  hint  a  favorable  sentiment 
in  their  behalf.  It  is  remarkable  that  the  whole  race  of 
prostitutes  in  New  York  were  tories ;  and  the  schemes  foi 
supporting  the  tory  cause  in  this  city,  for  which  severa* 
are  now  in  jail,  and  one  hanged,  were  concerted  and  car 
ried  on  in  common  bawdy-houses,  assisted  by  those  wh< 
kept  them. 

The  connexion  between  vice  and  meanness  is  a  fit  subject 
for  satire,  but  when  the  satire  is  a  fact,  it  cuts  with  the  irre 
sistible  power  of  a  diamond.  If  a  Quaker,  in  defence  of  hi> 
just  rights,  his  property,  and  the  chastity  of  his  house,  take* 
up  a  musket,  he  is  expelled  the  meeting ;  but  the  present 
king  of  England,  who  seduced  and  took  into  keeping  a  sistei 
of  their  society,  is  reverenced  and  supported  by  repeated 
Testimonies,  wnile  the  friendly  noodle  from  whom  she  was 
taken  (and  who  is  now  in  this  city)  continues  a  drudge  in  the 
service  of  his  rival,  as  if  proud  of  being  cuckolded  by  a  crea- 
ture called  a  king. 

Our  support  and  success  depend  on  such  a  variety  of  men 
and  circumstances,  that  every  one  who  does  but  wish  well, 
is  of  some  use :  there  are  men  who  have  a  strange  aversion 
to  arms,  yet  have  hearts  to  risk  every  shilling  in  the  cause, 
or  in  support  of  those  who  have  better  talents  for  defending 
it.  Nature,  in  the  arrangement  of  mankind,  has  fitted  some 
for  every  service  in  life :  were  all  soldiers,  all  would  starve 
and  go  naked,  and  were  none  soldiers,  all  would  be  slaves 
As  disaffection  to  independence  is  the  badge  of  a  tory,  s« 
affection  to  it  is  the  mark  of  a  whig ;  and  the  different  ser- 
vices of  the  whigs,  down  from  those  who  nobly  contribute 
every  thing,  to  those  who  have  nothing  to  render  but  their 
wishes,  tend  all  to  the  same  centre,  though  with  different 
degrees  of  merit  and  ability.  The  larger  we  make  the  circle, 
the  more  we  shall  harmonize,  and  the  stronger  we  shall  be. 
All  we  want  to  shut  out  is  disaffection,  and,  that  excluded, 
we  must  accept  from  each  other  such  duties  as  we  are  best 
fitted  to  bestow.  A  narrow  system  of  politics,  like  a  narrow 
system  of  religion,  is  calculated  only  to  sour  the  temper,  and 
be  at  variance  with  mankind. 

All  we  want  to  know  in  America  is  simply  this,  who  is  for 
independence,  and  who  ip  not  ?     Those  who  are  for  it,  wil] 


THE   CRISIS.  48 

rapport  it,  and  the  remainder  will  undoubtedly  see  the  rea- 
sonableness of  paying  the  charges ;  while  those  who  oppose 
or  seek  to  betray  it,  must  expect  the  more  rigid  fate  01  the 
jail  and  the  gibbet.  There  is  a  bastard  kind  of  generosity, 
which  being  extended  to  all  men,  is  as  fatal  to  society,  on 
one  hand,  as  the  want  of  true  generosity  is  on  the  other.  A 
lax  manner  of  administering  justice,  falsely  termed  modera- 
tion, has  a  tendency  both  to  dispirit  public  virtue,  and  pro- 
mote the  growth  of  public  evils.  Had  the  late  committee  of 
safety  taken  cognizance  of  the  last  Testimony  of  the  Quakers 
and  proceeded  against  such^  delinquents  as  were  concerned 
therein,  they  had,  probably,  prevented  the  treasonable  plans 
which  have  been  concerted  since.  When  one  villain  is  suf- 
fered to  escape,  it  encourages  another  to  proceed,  either  from 
a  hope  of  escaping  likewise,  or  an  apprehension  that  we  dare 
not  punish.  It  has  been  a  matter  of  general  surprise,  that 
no  notice  was  taken  of  the  incendiary  publication  of  the 
Quakers,  of  the  20th  of  November  last :  a  publication  evi- 
dently intended  to  promote  sedition  and  treason,  and  encour- 
age the  enemy,  who  were  then  within  a  day's  march  of  this 
city,  to  proceed  on  and  possess  it.  I  here  present  the  reader 
with  a  memorial  which  was  laid  before  the  board  of  safety 
a  few  days  after  the  Testimony  appeared.  Not  a  member 
of  that  board,  that  I  conversed  with,  but  expressed  the  high- 
est detestation  of  the  perverted  principles  and  conduct  of 
the  Quaker  junto,  and  a  wish  that  the  board  would  take 
the  matter  up ;  notwithstanding  which,  it  was  suffered  to 
pass  away  unnoticed,  to  the  encouragement  of  new  acts  of 
treason,  the  general  danger  of  the  cause,  and  the  disgrace  of 
the  state. 

To  the  honorable  the  Council  of  Safety  of  the  State  of  Pennsylvania. 

At  a  meeting  of  a  reputable  number  of  the  inhabitants  of 
the  city  of  Philadelphia,  impressed  with  a  proper  sense  of 
the  justice  of  the  cause  whicn  this  continent  is  engaged  in, 
and  animated  with  a  generous  fervor  for  supporting  the 
same,  it  was  resolved,  that  the  following  be  laid  before  the 
board  of  safety : 

"  We  profess  liberality  of  sentiment  to  all  men ;  with  this 
distinction  only,  that  those  who  do  not  deserve  it  would 
become  wise  and  seek  to  deserve  it.  We  hold  the  pure  doc- 
trices  of  universal  liberty  of  conscience,  and  conceive  it  our 
-rty  *o  endeavor  to  secure  that  su-red  right  to  others,  a* 


i  THE   CB18I8. 

well  as  to  defend  it  for  ourselves ;  for  we  undertake  not  to 
judge  of  the  religious  rectitude  of  tenets,  but  leave  the 
whole  matter  to  Him  who  made  us. 

"  We  persecute  no  man,  neither  will  we  abet  in  the  per- 
secution of  any  man  for  religion's  sake ;  our  common  rela- 
tion to  others  being  that  of  fellow-citizens  and  fellow-sub- 
jects of  one  single  community ;  and  in  this  line  of  connexion 
we  hold  out  the  right  hand  of  fellowship  to  all  men.  But 
we  should  conceive  ourselves  to  be  unworthy  members  of 
the  free  and  independent  states  of  America,  were  we  uncon- 
cernedly to  see  or  to  suffer  any  treasonable  wound,  public 
or  private,  directly  or  indirectly,  to  be  given  against  the 
peace  and  the  safety  of  the  same.  We  inquire  not  into  the 
rank  of  the  offenders,  nor  into  their  religious  persuasion ; 
we  have  no  business  with  either,  our  part  being  only  to  find 
them  out  and  exhibit  them  to  justice. 

"A  printed  paper,  dated  the  20th  of  November,  and 
signed  '  John  Pevibertonj  whom  we  suppose  to  be  an  inhabi- 
tant of  this  city,  has  lately  been  dispersed  abroad,  a  copy 
of  which  accompanies  this.  Had  the  framers  and  publish- 
ers of  that  paper  conceived  it  their  duty  to  exhort  the  youth 
and  others  of  their  society,  to  a  patient  submission  under 
the  present  trying  visitations,  and  humbly  to  await  the  even" 
of  heaven  towards  them,  they  had  therein  showed  a  Christ- 
ian temper,  and  we  had  been  silent;  but  the  anger  and 
political  virulence  with  which  their  instructions  are  given, 
and  the  abuse  with  which  they  stigmatize  all  ranks  of  men, 
not  thinking  like  themselves,  leave  no  doubt  on  our  minds 
from  what  spirit  their  publication  proceeded :  and  it  is  dis- 
graceful to  the  pure  cause  of  truth,  that  men  can  dally  with 
words  of  the  most  sacred  import,  and  play  them  off  as 
mechanically  as  if  religion  consisted  only  in  contrivance. 
We  know  of  no  instance  in  which  the  Quakers  have  been 
compelled  to  bear  arms,  or  to  do  any  which  might  strain 
their  conscience,  wherefore  their  advice,  '  to  withstand  and 
refuse  to  submit  to  the  arbitrary  instructions  and  ordinances 
of  men,'  appear  to  us  a  false  alarm,  and  could  only  be  trea- 
sonably calculated  to  gain  favor  with  our  enemies,  when 
they  are  seemingly  on  the  brink  of  invading  this  state,  or, 
what  is  still  worse,  to  weaken  the  hands  of  our  defence,  that 
their  entrance  into  this  city  might  be  made  practicable  and 
easy. 

"  We  disclaim  all  tumult  and  disorder  in  the  punishment 
of  offenders ;  and  wish  to  be  governed,  not  by  temper  but 


THE   CRISIS.  45 

by  reason,  in  the  manner  of  treating  them.  We  are  sensi- 
ble that  our  cause  has  suffered  by  the  two  following  errors ; 
first,  by  ill-judged  lenity  to  traitorous  persons  in  some  cases ; 
and,  secondly,  by  only  a  passionate  treatment  of  them  in 
others.  For  the  future  we  disown  both,  and  wish  to  be 
Bteady  in  our  proceedings,  and  serious  in  our  punishments. 

"  Every  state  in  America  has,  by  the  repeated  voice  of  its 
inhabitants,  directed  and  authorised  the  continental  congress 
to  publish  a  formal  declaration  of  independence  of,  and 
separation  from,  the  oppressive  king  and  parliament  of 
Gre  Britain ;  and  we  look  on  every  man  as  an  enemy 
who  does  not  in  some  line  or  other,  give  his  assistance 
towards  supporting  the  same  ;  at  the  same  time  we  consider 
the  offence  to  be  heightened  to  a  degree  of  unpardonable 
guilt,  when  such  persons,  under  the  show  of  religion, 
endeavor,  either  by  writing,  speaking,  or  otherwise,  to  sub- 
vert, overturn,  or  bring  reproach  upon  the  independence  of 
this  continent  as  declared  by  congress. 

The  publishers  of  the  paper  signed  *  John  PembertonJ 
have  called  in  loud  manner  to  their  friends  and  connexions, 
*  to  withstand  or  refuse'  obedience  to  whatever  '  instructions 
or  ordinances'  may  be  published,  not  warranted  by  (what 
they  call)  '  that  happy  constitution  under  which  they  and 
others  long  enjoyed  tranquillity  and  peace.'  If  this  be  not 
treason,  we  know  not  what  may  properly  be  called  by  that 
name. 

"  To  us  it  is  a  matter  of  surprise  and  astonishment,  that 
men  with  the  word  'peace,  peace?  continually  on  their  lips, 
should  be  so  fond  of  living  under  and  supporting  a  govern- 
ment, and  at  the  same  time  calling  it '  happy,'  which  is  never 
better  pleased  than  when  at  war — that  hath  filled  India  with 
carnage  and  famine,  Africa  with  slavery,  and  tampered  with 
Indians  and  negroes  to  cut  the  throats  of  the  freemen  of 
America.  We  conceive  it  a  disgrace  to  this  state,  to  harbor 
or  wink  at  such  palpable  hypocrisy.  But  as  we  seek  not  to 
hurt  the  hair  01  any  man's  nead,  when  we  can  make  our- 
ioivec,  »afe  without,  we  wish  such  persons  to  restore  peace  to 
themselves  and  us,  by  removing  themselves  to  some  part  of 
the  king  of  Great  Britain's  dominions,  as  by  that  means  they 
may  live  unmolested  by  us  and  we  by  them  ;  for  our  fixed 
opinion  is,  that  those  who  do  not  deserve  a  place  among  us, 
ought  not  to  have  one. 

"  We  conclude  with  requesting  the  council  of  safety  to 
take  into  consideration  the  paper  signed  '  John  Pemberton? 


46  THE   CRISIS. 

and  if  it  shall  appear  to  them  to  be  of  a  dangerous  tendency, 
or  of  a  treasonable  nature,  that  they  would  commit  the 
signer,  together  with  such  other  persons  as  they  can  discover 
were  concerned  therein,  into  custody,  until  such  time  as 
some  mode  of  trial  shall  ascertain  the  full  degree  of  their 
gvilt  and  punishment ;  in  the  doing  of  which,  we  wish  their 
judges,  whoever  they  may  be,  to  disregard  the  man,  hig 
connexions,  interest,  riches,  poverty,  or  principles  of  religion, 
and  to  attend  to  the  nature  of  his  offence  only." 

The  most  cavilling  sectarian  cannot  accuse  the  foregoing 
with  containing  the  least  ingredient  of  persecution.  The 
free  spirit  on  which  the  American  cause  is  founded,  disdains 
to  mix  with  such  an  impurity,  and  leaves  it  as  rubbish  fit 
only  for  narrow  and  suspicious  minds  to  grovel  in.  Suspicion 
and  persecution  are  weeds  of  the  same  dunghill,  and  flourish 
together.  Had  the  Quakers  minded  their  religion  and  their 
business,  they  might  have  lived  through  this  dispute  in 
enviable  ease,  and  none  would  have  molested  them.  The 
common  phrase  with  these  people  is,  '  Our  principles  are 
peace?  To  which  may  be  replied,  and  your  practices  ai*e 
the,  reverse  /  for  never  did  the  conduct  of  men  oppose  their 
own  doctrine  more  notoriously  than  the  present  race  of  the 
Quakers.  They  have  artfully  changed  themselves  into  a 
different  sort  of  people  to  what  they  used  to  be,  and  yet 
have  the  address  to  persuade  each  other  that  they  are  not 
altered;  like  antiquated  virgins,  they  see  not  the  havoc 
deformity  has  made  upon  them,  but  pleasantly  mistaking 
wrinkles  for  dimples,  conceive  themselves  yet  lovely  and 
wonder  at  the  stupid  world  for  not  admiring  them. 

Did  no  injury  arise  to  the  public  by  this  apostacy  of  the 
Quakers  from  themselves,  the  public  would  have  nothing  to 
do  with  it ;  but  as  both  the  design  and  consequences  are 
pointed  against  a  cause  in  which  the  whole  community  are 
interested,  it  is  therefore  no  longer  a  subject  confined  to  the 
cognizance  of  the  meeting  only,  but  comes,  as  a  matter  of 
criminality,  before  either  the  authority  of  the  particular 
state  in  which  it  is  acted,  or  of  the  continent  against  which 
it  operates.  Every  attempt,  now,  to  support  the  authority 
of  the  king  and  parliament  of  Great  Britain  over  America, 
is  treason  against  every  state  ;  therefore  it  is  impossible  that 
any  one  can  pardon  or  screen  from  punishment  an  offender 
against  all. 

But  to  proceed :  while  the  infatuated  tories  of  this  and 
other  states  were  last  spring  talking  of  commissioners, 


THE   ORISIb.  47 

accommodation,  making  the  matter  up,  and  the  Lord  knows 
what  stuff  and  nonsense,  their  good  king  and  ministry  were 
glutting  themselves  with  the  revenge  of  reducing  America 
to  unconditional  submission,  and  solacing  each  other  with 
the  certainty  of  conquering  it  in  one  campaign.  The  follow- 
ing quotations  are  from  the  parliamentary  register  of  the 
debates  of  the  house  of  lords,  March  5th,  1776  : 

"  The  Americans,"  says  lord  Talbot,*  "  have  been  obstinate, 
undutiful,  and  ungovernable  from  the  very  beginning,  from 
their  first  early  and  infant  settlements  ;  and  I  am  every  day 
more  and  more  convinced  that  this  people  never  will  be 
brought  back  to  their  duty,  and  the  subordinate  relation 
they  stand  in  to  this  cauntry,  till  reduced  to  unconditional, 
effectual  submission  /  no  concession  on  our  part,  no  lenity ',  no 
endurance,  will  have  any  other  effect  but  that  of  increasing 
their  insolence." 

"  The  struggle,"  says  lord  Townsend,f  "  is  now  a  struggle 
for  power ;  the  die  is  cast,  and  the  only  point  which  now  re- 
mains to  be  determined,  is,  in  what  manner  the  war  can  be 
most  effectually  prosecuted  and  speedily  finished,  in  order  to 
procure  that  unconditional  submission,  which  has  been  so 
ably  stated  by  the  noble  earl  with  the  white  staff;"  (meaning 
lord  Talbot,)  "  and  I  have  no  reason  to  doubt  that  the  mea- 
sures now  pursuing  will  put  an  end  to  the  war  in  the  course 
of  a  single  campaign.  Snould  it  linger  longer,  we  shall  then 
have  reason  to  expect  that  some  foreign  power  will  inter- 
fere, and  take  advantage  of  our  domestic  troubles  and  civil 
distractions." 

Lord  Littleton.  "  My  sentiments  are  pretty  well  known. 
I  shall  only  observe  now  that  lenient  measures  have  had  no 
other  effect  than  to  produce  insult  after  insult;  that  the 
more  we  conceded,  the  higher  America  rose  in  her  demands, 
and  the  more  insolent  she  has  grown.  It  is  for  this  reason 
that  I  am  now  for  the  most  effective  and  decisive  measures ; 
and  am  of  opinion  that  no  alternative  is  left  us,  but  to  relin- 
quish America  for  ever,  or  finally  determine  to  compel  her 
to  acknowledge  the  legislative  authority  of  this  country ;  and 
it  is  the  principle  of  an  unconditional  submission  I  would  be 
for  maintaining." 

Can  words  be  more  expressive  than  these?  Surely  the 
tones  will  believe  the  tory  lords !  The  truth  is,  they  do  be- 

'  Rreward  of  the  king's  household. 

f  Formerly,   general   Townsend,   at   Quebec,  and   late   lord-lieutenant   of 

Ireland. 


48  THE   CRISIS. 

lieve  them,  and  know  as  fully  as  any  whig  on  the  continent 
knows,  that  the  king  and  ministry  never  had  the  least  design 
of  an  accommodation  with  America,  but  an  absolute,  uncon- 
ditional conquest.  And  the  part  which  the  tories  were  to 
act,  was,  by  downright  lying,  to  endeavour  to  put  the  conti- 
nent off  its  guard,  and  to  divide  and  sow  discontent  in  the 
minds  of  such  whigs  as  they  might  gain  an  influence  over. 
In  short,  to  keep  up  a  distraction  here,  that  the  force  sent 
from  England  might  be  able  to  conquer  in  "  one  campaign" 
They  and  the  ministry  were,  by  a  different  game,  playing 
into  each  other's  hands.  The  cry  of  the  tories  in  England 
was,  " No  reconciliation,  no  accommodation"  in  order  to 
obtain  the  greater  military  force ;  while  those  in  America 
were  crying  nothing  but  "reconciliation  and  accommoda- 
tion" that  the  force  sent  might  conquer  with  the  less  re- 
sistance. 

But  this  "  single  campaign  "  is  over,  and  America  not  con- 
quered. The  whole  work  is  yet  to  do,  and  the  force  much 
less  to  do  it  with.  Their  condition  is  both  despicable  and 
deplorable :  out  of  cash — out  of  heart,  and  out  of  hope.  A 
country  furnished  with  arms  and  ammunition,  as  America 
now  is,  with  three  millions  of  inhabitants,  and  three  thousand 
miles  distant  from  the  nearest  enemy  that  can  approach  her, 
is  able  to  look  and  laugh  them  in  the  face. 

Howe  appears  to  have  two  objects  in  view,  either  to  go  up 
the  North  river,  or  come  to  Philadelphia. 

By  going  up  the  North  river,  he  secures  a  retreat  for  his 
army  through  Canada,  but  the  ships  must  return  if  they  re- 
turn at  all,  the  same  way  they  went ;  as  our  army  would  be 
in  the  rear,  the  safety  of  their  passage  down  is  a  doubtful 
matter.  By  such  a  motion  he  shuts  himself  from  all  supplies 
from  Europe,  but  through  Canada,  and  exposes  his  army 
and  navy  to  the  danger  of  perishing.  The  idea  of  his  cut- 
ting off  the  communication  between  the  eastern  and  southern 
states,  by  means  of  the  North  river,  is  merely  visionary. 
He  cannot  do  it  by  his  shipping,  because  no  ship  can  lay 
long  at  anchor  in  any  river  within  reach  of  the  shore ;  a 
single  gun  would  drive  a  first  rate  from  such  a  station. 
This  was  fully  proved  last  October  at  forts  Washington 
and  Lee,  where  one  gun  only,  on  each  side  of  the  river, 
obliged  two  frigates  to  cut  and  be  towed  off  in  an  hour's 
time.  Neither  can  he  cut  it  off  by  his  army ;  because  the 
several  posts  they  must  occupy,  would  divide  them  almost 
to  nothing,  and  expose  thurn  to  be  picked  up  by  ours  like 


THE   CRISIS.  49 

pebbles  on  a  river's  bank.  But  admitting  that  he  could, 
where  is  the  injury  ?  Because,  while  his  whole  force  is  can- 
toned out,  as  sentries  over  the  water,  they  will  be  very  in- 
nocently employed,  and  the  moment  they  march  into  the 
country,  the  communication  opens. 

The  most  probable  object  is  Philadelphia,  and  the  reasons 
are  many.  Howe's  business  is  to  conquer  it,  and  in  propor- 
tion as  ne  finds  himself  unable  to  the  task,  he  will  employ 
his  strength  to  distress  women  and  weak  minds,  in  order  to 
accomplish  through  their  fears  what  he  cannot  accomplish 
by  his  own  force.  His  coming  or  attempting  to  come  to 
Philadelphia  is  a  circumstance  that  proves  nis  weakness :  for 
no  general  that  felt  himself  able  to  take  the  field  and  attack 
his  antagonist,  would  think  of  bringing  his  army  into  a  city 
in  the  summer  time ;  and  this  mere  shifting  the  scene  from 
place  to  place,  without  effecting  any  thing,  has  feebleness 
and  cowardice  on  the  face  of  it,  and  holds  him  up  in  a  con- 
temptible light  to  all  who  can  reason  justly  and  firmly. 
By  several  informations  from  New  York,  it  appears  that 
their  army  in  general,  both  officers  and  men,  Lave  given 
up  the  expectation  of  conquering  America ;  their  eye  now 
is  fixed  upon  the  spoil.  They  suppose  Philadelphia  to  be 
rich  with  stores,  and  as  they  think  to  get  more  by  robbing 
a  town  than  by  attacking  an  army,  their  movement  towards 
this  city  is  probable.  We  are  not  now  contending  against 
an  army  of  soldiers,  but  against  a  band  of  thieves,  who  had 
rather  plunder  than  fight,  and  have  no  other  hope  of  con- 
quest tnan  by  cruelty. 

They  expect  to  get  a  mighty  booty,  and  strike  another 
general  panic,  by  making  a  sudden  movement  and  getting 
possession  of  this  city ;  but  unless  they  can  march  out  as 
well  as  in,  or  get  the  entire  command  of  the  river,  to  remove 
off  their  plunder,  they  may  probably  be  stopped  with  the 
stolen  goods  upon  them.  They  have  never  yet  succeeded 
wherever  they  nave  been  opposed,  but  at  fort  Washington. 
At  Charleston  their  defeat  was  effectual.  At  Ticonderoga 
they  ran  away.  In  every  skirmish  at  Kingsbridge  and  the 
White  Plains  they  were  obliged  to  retreat,  and  the  instant 
that  our  arms  were  turned  upon  them  in  the  Jerseys,  they 
turned  likewise,  and  those  that  turned  not  were  taken. 

The  necessity  of  always  fitting  our  internal  police  to  the 
circumstances  of  the  times  we  live  in,  is  something  so  strik- 
ingly obvious,  that  no  sufficient  objection  can  be  made 
against  it.  The  safety  of  all  societies  depends  upon  it ;  and 


50  THE   CEISlb. 

where  this  point  is  not  attended  to,  the  consequences  will 
either  be  a  general  languor  or  a  tumult.  The  encouragement 
and  protection  of  the  good  subjects  of  any  state,  and  the 
suppression  and  punishment  of  bad  ones,  are  the  principal 
objects  for  which  all  authority  is  instituted,  and  the  line  in 
which  it  ought  to  operate.  We  have  in  this  city  a  strange 
variety  of  men  and  characters,  and  the  circumstances  of  the 
times  require  that  they  should  be  publicly  known  ;  it  is  not 
the  number  of  tories  that  hurt  us,  so  much  as  the  not  find- 
ing out  who  they  are ;  men  must  now  take  one  side  or  the 
other,  and  abide  by  the  consequences :  the  Quakers,  trusting 
to  their  short-sighted  sagacity,  have,  most  unluckily  for 
them,  made  their  declaration  in  their  last  Testimony,  and 
>ve  ought  now  to  take  them  at  their  word.  They  have  vo- 
untarily  read  themselves  out  of  continental  meeting,  and 
cannot  hope  to  be  restored  to  it  again  but  by  payment  and 
penitence.  Men  whose  political  principles  are  .founded  on 
avarice,  are  beyond  the  reach  of  reason,  and  the  only  cure 
of  toryism  of  this  cast,  is  to  tax  it.  A  substantial  good 
drawn  from  a  real  evil,  is  of  the  same  benefit  to  society,  as 
if  drawn  from  a  virtue ;  and  where  men  have  not  public 
spirit  to  reflder  themselves  serviceable,  it  ought  to  be  the 
study  of  government  to  draw  the  best  use  possible  from 
their  vices.  When  the  governing  passion  of  any  man,  or 
set  of  men,  is  once  known,  the  method  of  managing  them  is 
easy ;  for  even  misers,  whom  no  public  virtue  can  impress, 
would  become  generous,  could  a  heavy  tax  be  laid  upon 
covetousness. 

The  tories  have  endeavored  to  insure  their  property  with 
the  enemy,  by  forfeiting  their  reputation  with  us;  from 
which  may  be  justly  inferred,  that  their  governing  passion  is 
avarice.  Make  them  as  much  afraid  of  losing  on  one  side 
as  on  the  other,  and  you  stagger  their  toryism ;  make  them 
/nore  so,  and  you  reclaim  them;  for  their  principle  is  to 
worship  the  power  which  they  are  most  afraid  of. 

This  method  of  considering  men  and  things  together,  opens 
into  a  large  field  for  speculation,  and  affords  me  an  oppor- 
tunity of  offering  some  observations  on  the  state  of  our  cur- 
rency, so  as  to  make  the  support  of  it  go  hand  in  hand  with 
the  suppression  of  disaffection  and  the  encouragement  of 
public  spirit. 

The  thing  which  first  presents  itself  in  inspecting  the  state 
of  the  currency,  is,  that  we  have  too  much  of  it,  and  that 
there  is  a  necessity  of  reducing  the  quantity ,  in  order  to 


THE   CRISIS.  51 

increase  the  value.  Men  are  daily  growing  poor  by  the  very 
means  that  they  take  to  get  rich ;  for  in  the  same  proportion 
that  the  prices  of  all  goods  on  hand  are  raised,  the  value  of 
all  money  laid  by  is  reduced.  A  simple  case  will  make  this 
clear ;  let  a  man  have  a  1001.  in  cash,  and  as  many  goods  on 
hand  as  will  to-day  sell  for  20Z.  but  not  content  with  the 
present  market  price,  he  raises  them  to  401.  and  by  so  doing 
obliges  others,  in  their  own  defence,  to  raise  cent,  per  cent, 
likewise ;  in  this  case  it  is  evident  that  his  hundreu  pounds 
laid  by,  is  reduced  fifty  pounds  in  value ;  whereas,  had  the 
market  lowered  cent,  per  cent,  his  goods  would  have  sold  but 
for  ten,  but  his  hundred  pounds  would  have  risen  in  value 
to  two  hundred ;  because  it  would  then  purchase  as  many 
goods  again,  or  support  his  family  as  long  again  as  before 
And,  strange  as  it  may  seem,  he  is  one  hundred  and  fifty 
pounds  the  poorer  for  raising  his  goods,  to  what  he  would 
have  been  had  he  lowered  them ;  because  the  forty  pounds 
which  his  goods  sold  for,  is,  by  the  general  raise  of  the  mar- 
ket cent,  per  cent.,  rendered  of  no  more  value  than  the  ten 
pounds  would  be  had  the  market  fallen  in  the  same  propor- 
tion; and,  consequently,  the  whole  difference  of  gain  or  loss 
is  on  the  difference  in  value  of  the  hundred  pounds  laid  by, 
viz.  from  fifty  to  two  hundred.  This  rage  for  raising  goods 
is  for  several  reasons  much  more  the  fault  of  the  tories  than 
the  whigs ;  and  yet  the  tories  (to  their  shame  and  confusion 
ought  they  to  be  told  of  it)  are  by  far  the  most  noisy  and 
discontented.  The  greatest  part  of  the  whigs,  by  being  now 
either  in  the  army  or  employed  in  some  public  service,  are 
buyers  only  and  not  sellers,  and  as  this  evil  has  its  origin  in 
trade,  it  cannot  be  charged  on  those  who  are  out  of  it. 

But  the  grievance  has  now  become  too  general  to  be  re- 
medied by  partial  methods,  and  the  only  effectual  cure  is  to 
reduce  the  quantity  of  money :  with  half  the  quantity  we 
should  be  richer  than  we  are  now,  because  the  value  of  it 
would  be  doubled,  and  consequently  our  attachment  to  it 
increased ;  for  it  is  not  the  number  of  dollars  a  man  has, 
but  how  far  they  will  go,  that  makes  him  either  rich  or 
poor. 

These  two  points  being  admitted,  viz.  that  the  quantity 
of  money  is  too  great,  and  that  the  prices  of  goods  can  only 
be  effectually  reduced  by  reducing  the  quantity  of  the 
money,  the  next  point  to  be  considered  is,  tne  method  how 
to  reduce  it. 

The  circumstances  of  the  times,  as  before  observed,  re 


52  THE   CRISIS. 

quire  that  the  public  characters  of  all  men  should  now  be 
mlly  understood,  and  the  only  general  method  of  ascertain- 
ing it  is  by  an  oath  or  affirmation,  renouncing  all  allegiance 
to  the  king  of  Great  Britain,  and  to  support  the  indepen- 
dence of  the  United  States,  as  declared  by  congress.  Let, 
at  the  same  time  a  tax  of  ten,  fifteen,  or  twenty  per  cent, 
per  annum,  to  be  collected  quarterly,  be  levied  on  all  pro- 
perty. These  alternatives,  by  being  perfectly  voluntary,  will 
take  in  all  sorts  of  people.  Here  is  the  test ;  here  is  the  tax. 
He  who  takes  the  former,  conscientiously  proves  his  affection 
to  the  cause,  and  binds  himself  to  pay  his  quota  by  the  best 
services  in  his  power,  and  is  thereby  justly  exempt  from  the 
/<•  cter ;  and  those  who  choose  the  latter,  pay  their  quota  in 
money,  to  be  excused  from  the  former,  or  rather,  it  is  the 
price  paid  to  us  for  their  supposed,  though  mistaken,  insur- 
surance  with  the  enemy. 

But  this  is  only  a  part  of  the  advantage  which  would 
arise  by  knowing  the  different  characters  of  the  men.  The 
whigs  stake  every  thing  on  the  issue  of  their  arms,  while 
the  tories,  by  their  disaffection,  are  sapping  and  under- 
mining their  strength  ;  and,  of  consequence,  the  property  of 
the  whigs  is  the  more  exposed  thereby ;  and  whatever  injury 
their  states  may  sustain  by  the  movements  of  the  enemy, 
must  either  be  borne  by  themselves,  who  have  done  every 
thing  which  has  yet  been  done,  or  by  the  tories,  who  have 
not  only  done  nothing,  but  have,  by  their  disaffection, 
invited  the  enemy  on. 

In  the  present  crisis  we  ought  to  know,  square  by  square, 
and  house  by  house,  who  are  in  real  allegiance  with  the 
United  Independent  States,  and  who  are  not.  Let  but  the 
line  be  made  clear  and  distinct,  and  all  men  will  then  know 
what  they  are  to  trust  to.  It  would  not  only  be  good 
policy  but  strict  justice,  to  raise  fifty  or  one  hundred  thou- 
sand pounds,  or  more,  if  it  is  necessary,  out  of  the  estates 
and  property  of  the  king  of  England's  votaries,  resident  in 
Philadelphia,  to  be  distributed,  as  a  reward  to  those  in- 
habitants of  the  city  and  state,  who  should  turn  out  and 
repulse  the  enemy,  should  they  attempt  to  march  this  way ; 
and  likewise,  to  bind  the  property  of  all  such  persons  to 
make  good  the  damages  which  that  of  the  whigs  might  sus- 
tain. In  the  undistinguishable  mode  of  conducting  war,  we 
frequently  make  reprisals  at  sea,  on  the  vessels  of  persons  in 
England,  who  are  friends  to  our  cause,  compared  with  the 
resident  tories  among  us. 


THE   CRISIS.  53 

In  every  former  publication  of  mine,  from  Common  Sense 
down  to  the  last  Crisis,  I  have  generally  gone  on  the 
charitable  supposition,  that  the  tones  were  rather  a  mis- 
taken than  a  criminal  people,  and  have  applied  argument 
after  argument,  with  all  the  candor  and  temper  which  1 
was  capable  of,  in  order  to  set  every  part  of  the  case  clearly 
and  fairly  before  them,  and  if  possible  to  reclaim  them  from 
ruin  to  reason.  I  have  done  my  duty  by  them  and  have 
now  done  with  that  doctrine,  taking  it  for  granted,  that 
those  who  yet  hold  their  disaffection,  are,  either  a  set  of 
avaricious  miscreants,  who  would  sacrifice  the  continent  to 
save  themselves,  or  a  banditti  of  hungry  traitors,  who  are 
hoping  for  a  division  of  the  spoil.  To  which  may  be  added, 
a  list  of  crown  or  proprietary  dependants,  who,  rather  than 
go  without  a  portion  of  power,  would  be  content  to  share  it 
with  the  devil.  Of  such  men  there  is  no  hope  ;  and  their 
obedience  will  only  be  according  to  the  danger  set  before 
them,  and  the  power  that  is  exercised  over  them. 

A  time  will  shortly  arrive,  in  which,  by  ascertaining  the 
characters  of  persons  now,  we  shall  be  guarded  against  their 
mischiefs  then ;  for  in  proportion  as  the  enemy  despair  of 
conquest,  they  will  be  trying  the  arts  of  seduction  and  the 
force  of  fear  by  all  the  mischiefs  which  they  can  inflict. 
But  in  war  we  may  be  certain  of  these  two  things,  viz.  that 
cruelty  in  an  enemy,  and  motions  made  with  more  than 
usual  parade,  are  always  signs  of  weakness.  He  that  can 
conquer,  finds  his  mind,  too  free  and  pleasant  to  be  brutish ; 
and  lie  that  intends  to  conquer,  never  makes  too  much  show 
of  his  strength. 

We  now  know  the  enemy  we  have  to  do  with.  "WTiile 
drunk  with  the  certainty  of  victory,  they  disdained  to  be 
civil ;  and  in  proportion  as  disappointment  makes  them  so- 

3r,  and  their  apprehensions  01  an  Europe 


ber,  and  their  apprehensions  of  an  European  war  alarm 
them,  they  will  become  cringing  and  artful;  honest  they 
cannot  be.  But  our  answer  to  them,  in  either  condition 
they  may  be  in,  is  short  and  full — "  As  free  and  independent 
states  we  are  willing  to  make  peace  with  you  to-morrow, 
but  we  neither  can  hear  nor  reply  in  any  other  character." 

If  Britain  cannot  conquer  us,  it  proves  that  she  is  neither 
able  to  govern  nor  protect  us,  and  our  particular  situation 
now  is  such,  that  any  connexion  with  her  would  be  unwisely 
exchanging  a  half-defeated  enemy  for  two  powerful  ones. 
Europe,  by  every  appearance,  is  now  on  the  eve,  nay,  on 
the  morning  twilight  of  a  war,  and  any  alliance  with  George 


54  THE   CRISIS. 

the  third,  brings  France  and  Spain  upon  our  backs ;  a  sepa- 
ration from  him  attaches  them  to  our  side ;  therefore,  the 
only  road  to  peace,  honor  and  commerce,  is  Independence. 

W  ritten  this  fourth  year  of  the  UNION,  which  God  pre* 
serve. 

COMMON  SENSE. 

Philadelphia,  April  19,  1W 


tfUMBEK   IY. 

THOSE  who  expect  to  reap  the  blessings  of  freedom,  must, 
like  men,  undergo  the  fatigues  of  supporting  it.  The  event 
of  yesterday  was  one  of  those  kind  alarms  which  is  just  suf- 
ficient to  rouse  us  to  duty,  without  being  of  consequence 
enough  to  depress  our  fortitude.  It  is  not  a  field  of  a  few 
acres  of  ground,  but  a  cause,  that  we  are  defending,  and 
whether  we  defeat  the  enemy  in  one  battle,  or  by  degrees, 
the  consequence  will  be  the  same. 

Look  back  at  the  events  of  last  winter  and  the  present 
year  ;  there  you  will  find  that  the  enemy's  successes  always 
contributed  to  reduce  them.  What  they  have  gained  in 
ground,  they  paid  so  dearly  for  in  numbers,  that  their  vic- 
tories have  in  the  end  amounted  to  defeats.  We  have 
always  been  masters  at  the  last  push,  and  always  shall  be 
while  we  do  our  duty.  Howe  has  been  once  on  the  banks 
of  the  Delaware,  and  from  thence  driven  back  with  loss  and 
disgrace :  and  why  not  be  again  driven  from  the  Schuylkill  ? 
His  condition  and  ours  are  very  different.  He  has  every- 
body to  fight,  we  have  only  his  one  army  to  cope  with,  and 
which  wastes  away  at  every  engagement :  we  can  not  only 
reinforce,  but  can  redouble  our  numbers ;  he  is  cut  off  from 
all  supplies,  and  must  sooner  or  later  inevitably  fall  into 
our  hands. 

Shall  a  band  of  ten  or  twelve  thousand  robbers,  who  are 
this  day  fifteen  hundred  or  two  thousand  men  less  in  strength 
than  they  were  yesterday,  conquer  America,  or  subdue  even 
a  single  state?  The  thing  cannot  be,  unless  we  sit  down 
and  suffer  them  to  do  it.  Another  such  a  brush,  notwith- 
standing we  lost  the  ground,  would,  by  still  reducing  the 
enemy,  put  them  in  a  condition  to  be  afterwards  totally  de- 
feat ' 


THE   GBISI8.  55 

Could  our  whole  army  have  come  up  to  the  attack  at  one 
time,  the  consequences  had  probably  been  otherwise ;  but 
our  having  different  parts  of  the  Brandy  wine  creek  to  guard, 
and  the  uncertainty  which  road  to  Philadelphia  the  enemy 
would  attempt  to  take,  naturally  afforded  them  an  oppor- 
tunity of  passing  with  their  main  body  at  a  place  where  only 
a  part  01  ours  could  be  posted ;  for  it  must  strike  every 
thinking  man  with  conviction,  that  it  requires  a  mucn 
greater  force  to  oppose  an  enemy  in  several  places,  than  is 
sufficient  to  defeat  him  in  any  one  place. 

Men  who  are  sincere  in  defending  their  freedom,  will 
always  feel  concern  at  every  circumstance  which  seems  to 
make  against  them  ;  it  is  the  natural  and  honest  consequence 
of  all  affectionate  attachments,  and  the  want  of  it  is  a  vice. 
But  the  dejection  lasts  only  for  a  moment ;  they  soon  rise 
out  of  it  with  additional  vigor ;  the  glow  of  hope,  courage 
and  fortitude,  will,  in  a  little  time,  supply  the  place  of  every 
inferior  passion,  and  kindle  the  whole  heart  into  heroism. 

There  is  a  mystery  in  the  countenance  of  some  causes, 
which  we  have  not  always  present  judgment  enough  to 
explain.  It  is  distressing  to'  see  an  enemy  advancing  into  a 
country,  but  it  is  the  only  place  in  which  we  can  beat  them, 
and  in  which  we  have  always  beaten  them,  whenever  they 
made  the  attempt.  The  nearer  any  disease  approaches  to  a 
crisis,  the  nearer  it  is  to  a  cure.  Danger  and  deliverance 
make  their  advances  together,  and  it  is  only  the  last  push, 
in  which  one  or  the  other  takes  the  lead. 

There  are  many  men  who  will  do  their  duty  when  it  is 
not  wanted;  but  a  genuine  public  spirit  always  appears 
most  when  there  is  most  occasion  for  it.  Thank  God  1  our 
army,  though  fatigued,  is  yet  entire.  The  attack  made  by 
us  yesterday,  was  under  many  disadvantages,  naturally 
arising  from  the  uncertainty  of  knowing  which  route  the 
enemy  would  take ;  and,  from  that  circumstance,  the  whole 
of  our  force  could  not  be  brought  up  together  time  enough 
to  engage  all  at  once.  Our  strength  is  yet  reserved ;  and  it 
is  evident  that  Howe  does  not  think  himself  a  gainer  by  the 
affair,  otherwise  he  would  this  morning  have  moved  do  wn 
and  attacked  general  Washington. 

Gentlemen  of  the  city  and  country,  it  is  in  your  power, 
by  a  spirited  improvement  of  the  present  circumstance,  to 
turn  it  to  a  real  advantage.  Howe  is  now  weaker  than 
before,  and  every  shot  will  continue  to  reduce  him.  You 
are  more  immediately  interested  than  any  other  part  of  the 


56  THE   CKI8I8. 

continent ;  your  all  is  at  stake  ;  it  is  not  so  with  the  general 
cause ;  you  are  devoted  by  the  enemy  to  plunder  and 
destruction :  it  is  the  encouragement  which  Howe,  the  chief 
of  plunderers,  has  promised  his  army.  Thus  circumstanced, 
you  may  save  yourselves  by  a  manly  resistance,  and  you 
can  have  no  hope  in  any  other  conduct.  I  never  yet  knew 
our  brave  general,  or  any  part  of  the  army,  officers  or  men, 
out  of  heart,  and  I  have  seen  them  in  circumstances  a 
thousand  times  more  trying  than  the  present.  It  is  only 
those  that  are  not  in  action,  that  feel  languor  and  heaviness, 
and  the  best  way  to  rub  it  off  is  to  turn  out,  and  make  sure 
work  of  it. 

Our  army  must  undoubtedly  feel  fatigue,  and  want  a 
reinforcement,  of  rest,  though  not  of  valour.  Our  own 
interest  and  happiness  call  upon  us  to  give  them  every 
support  in  our  power,  and  make  the  burden  of  the  day,  on 
which  the  safety  of  this  city  depends,  as  light  as  possible 
Remember,  gentlemen,  that  we  have  forces  both  to  the 
northward  and  southward  of  Philadelphia,  and  if  the  enemy 
be  but  stopped  till  those  can  arrive,  this  city  will  be  saved, 
and  the  enemy  finally  routed.  You  have  too  much  at  stake 
to  hesitate.  You  ought  not  to  think  an  hour  upon  the 
matter,  but  to  spring  to  action  at  once.  Other  states  have 
been  invaded,  have  likewise  driven  off  the  invaders.  Now 
our  time  and  turn  is  come,  and  perhaps  the  finishing  stroke 
is  reserved  for  us.  When  we  look  back  on  the  dangers  we 
have  been  saved  from,  and  reflect  on  the  success  we  have 
been  blessed  with,  it  would  be  sinful  either  to  be  idle  or  to 
despair. 

I  close  this  paper  with  a  short  address  to  general  Howe. 
You,  sir,  are  only  lingering  out  the  period  that  shall  bring 
with  it  your  defeat.  You  have  yet  scarce  begun  upon  the 
war,  and  the  further  you  enter,  the  faster  will  your  troubles 
thicken.  What  you  now  enjoy  is  only  a  respite  from  ruin  ; 
an  invitation  to  destruction  ;  something  that  will  lead  on  to 
our  deliverance  at  your  expense.  We  know  the  cause  which 
we  are  engaged  in,  and  though  a  passionate  fondness  for  it 
may  make  us  grieve  at  every  injury  which  threatens  it,  yet, 
when  the  moment  of  concern  is  over,  the  determination  to 
duty  returns.  We  are  not  moved  by  the  gloomy  smile  of  a 
worthless  king,  but  by  the  ardent  glow  of  generous  patriot- 
ism. We  fight  not  to  enslave,  but  to  set  a  country  free,  and 
to  make  room  upon  the  earth  for  honest  men  to  live  in.  In 
such  a  case  we  are  sure  that  we  are  right ;  and  we  leave  to. 


FHB   CRISIS.  57 

you  the  despairing  reflection  of  being  the  tool  of  a  miserable 
tyrant. 

COMMON  SENSE. 

Philadelphia,  Sept.  12,  1777. 


NUMBER    V. 
TO  GEN.  SIR  WILLIAM  HOWE. 

To  argue  with  a  man  who  has  renounced  the  use  and  au- 
thority of  reason,  and  whose  philosophy  consists  in  holding 
humanity  in  contempt,  is  like  administering  medicine  to  the 
dead,  or  endeavouring  to  convert  an  atheist  by  scripture. 
Enjoy,  sir,  your  insensibility  of  feeling  and  reflecting.  It  is 
the  prerogative  of  animals.  And  no  man  will  envy  you  those 
honours,  in  which  a  savage  only  can  be  your  rival  and  a  bear 
your  master. 

As  the  generosity  of  this  country  rewarded  your  brother's 
services  last  war,  with  an  elegant  monument  in  "Westminster 
Abbey,  it  is  consistent  that  she  should  bestow  some  mark  of 
distinction  upon  you.  You  certainly  deserve  her  notice,  and 
a  conspicuous  place  in  the  catalogue  of  extraordinary  per- 
sons. Yet  it  would  be  a  pity  to  pass  you  from  the  world  in 
state,  and  consign  you  to  magnificent  oblivion  among  the 
tombs,  without  telling  the  future  beholder  why.  Judas  is  as 
much  known  as  John,  yet  history  ascribes  their  fame  to  very 
different  actions. 

Sir  William  hath  undoubtedly  merited  a  monument ;  but 
of  what  kind,  or  with  what  inscription,  where  placed  or  how 
embellished,  is  a  question  that  would  puzzle  all  the  heralds 
of  St.  James's  in  the  profoundest  mood  of  historical  deliber- 
ation. We  are  at  no  loss,  sir,  to  ascertain  your  real  charac- 
ter, but  somewhat  perplexed  how  to  perpetuate  its  identity, 
and  preserve  it  uninjured  from  the  transformations  of  time 
or  mistake.  A  statuary  may  give  a  false  expression  to  your 
bust,  or  decorate  it  with  some  equivocal  emblems,  by  which 
you  may  happen  to  steal  into  reputation  and  impose  upon 
the  hereafter  traditionary  world.  Ill  nature  or  ridicule  may 
conspire,  or  a  variety  of  accidents  combine  to  lessen,  enlarge, 
or  change  Sir  William's  fame ;  and  no  doubt  but  he  who 
h*s  taken  so  much  pains  to  be  singular  in  his  conduct,  w  »ild 


THE    OBI8I8. 

choose  to  be  just  as  singular  in  his  exit,  his  monument  and 
his  epitaph. 

The  usual  honours  of  the  dead,  to  be  sure,  are  not  suffi- 
ciently sublime,  to  escort  a  character  like  you  to  the  repub- 
lic of  dust  and  ashes ;  for  however  men  may  differ  in  their 
ideas  of  grandeur  or  of  government  here,  the  grave  is 
nevertheless  a  perfect  republic.  Death  is  not  the  monarch 
of  the  dead,  but  of  the  dying.  The  moment  he  obtains 
a  conquest  he  loses  a  subject,  and,  like  the  foolish  king 
you  serve,  will,  in  the  end,  war  himself  out  of  all  his  do- 
minions. 

As  a  proper  preliminary  towards  the  arrangement  of  your 
funeral  nonours,  we  readily  admit  of  you?  new  rank  of 
knighthood.  The  title  is  perfectly  in  character,  and  is  your 
own,  more  by  merit  than  creation.  There  are  knights  of 
various  orders,  from  the  knight  of  the  windmill  to  the  knight 
of  the  post.  The  former  is  your  pattern  for  exploits,  and  the 
latter  will  assist  you  in  settling  your  accounts.  No  honour- 
ary  title  could  be  more  happily  applied  !  The  ingenuity  is 
sublime !  And  your  royal  master  hath  discovered  more 
genius  in  fitting  you  therewith,  than  in  generating  the  most 
finished  figure  for  a  button,  or  descanting  on  the  properties 
of  a  button  mould. 

But  how,  sir,  shall  we  dispose  of  you  ?  The  invention  of 
a  statuary  is  exhausted,  and  Sir  William  is  yet  unprovided 
with  a  monument.  America  is  anxious  to  bestow  her  fune- 
ral favours  upon  you,  and  wishes  to  do  it  in  a  manner  that 
shall  distinguish  you  from  all  the  deceased  heroes  of  the  last 
war.  The  Egyptian  method  of  embalming  is  not  known  to 
the  present  age,  and  hieroglyphical  pageantry  hath  outlived 
the  science  of  decyphering  it.  Some  other  method,  therefore, 
must  be  thought  of  to  immortalize  the  new  knight  of  the 
windmill  and  post.  Sir  "William,  thanks  to  his  stars,  is  noit 
oppressed  with  very  delicate  ideas.  He  has  no  ambition  of 
being  wrapped  up  and  handed  about  in  myrrh,  aloes  and 
cassia.  Less  expensive  odours  will  suffice ;  and  it  fortunately 
happens,  that  the  simple  genius  of  America  hath  discovered 
the  art  of  preserving  bodies,  and  embellishing  them  too,  with 
much  greater  frugality  than  the  ancients.  In  balmage,  sir, 
of  humble  tar,  you  will  be  as  secure  as  Pharaoh,  and  in  «* 
hieroglyphic  of  feathers,  rival  in  finery  all  the  mummies  of 
Egypt. 

As  you  have  already  made  your  exit  from  the  moral 
world,  and  by  numberless  acts  both  of  passionate  and  deli 


THE   CEIS18.  59 

herate  injustice,  engraved  an  "  here  lyeth  "  on  your  deceased 
honour,  it  must  be  mere  affectation  in  you  to  pretend  con- 
cern at  the  humours  or  opinions  of  mankind  respecting  you. 
What  remains  of  you  may  expire  at  any  time.  The  sooner 
the  better.  For  he  who  survives  his  reputation,  lives  out 
of  despite  of  himself,  like  a  man  listening  to  his  own 
reproach. 

Thus  entombed  and  ornamented,  I  leave  you  to  the  inspec- 
tion of  the  curious,  and  return  to  the  history  of  your  yet 
surviving  actions. — The  character  of  Sir  William  nath  un- 
dergone some  extraordinary  revolutions  since  his  arrival  in 
America.  It  is  now  fixed  and  known ;  and  we  have  nothing 
to  hope  from  your  candour  or  to  fear  from  your  capacity. 
Indolence  and  inability  have  too  large  a  share  in  your  com- 
position, ever  to  suffer  you  to  be  anything  more  than  the 
hero  of  little  villanies  and  unfinished  adventures.  That, 
which  to  some  persons  appeared  moderation  in  you  at  first, 
was  not  produced  by  any  real  virtue  of  your  own,  but  by  a 
contrast  of  passions,  dividing  and  holding  you  in  perpetual 
irresolution.  One  vice  will  frequently  expel  another,  without 
the  least  merit  in  the  man,  as  powers  in  contrary  directions 
reduce  each  other  to  rest. 

It  became  you  to  have  supported  a  dignified  solemnity  of 
character ;  to  have  shown  a  superior  liberality  of  soul ;  to 
have  won  respect  by  an  obstinate  perseverance  in  maintain- 
ing order,  and  to  have  exhibited  on  all  occasions,  such  an 
unchangeable  graciousness  of  conduct,  that  while  we  beheld 
in  you  the  resolution  of  an  enemy,  we  might  admire  in  you 
the  sincerity  of  a  man.  You  came  to  America  under  the 
high  sounding  titles  of  commander  and  commissioner ;  not 
only  to  suppress  what  you  call  rebellion,  by  arms,  but  to 
shame  it  out  of  countenance,  by  the  excellence  of  your  ex- 
ample. Instead  of  which,  you  have  been  the  patron  of  low 
and  vulgar  frauds,  the  encourager  of  Indian  cruelties ;  and 
have  imported  a  cargo  of  vices  blacker  than  those  which  you 
pretend  to  suppress. 

Mankind  are  not  universally  agreed  in  their  determination 
of  right  and  wrong ;  but  there  are  certain  actions  which  the 
consent  of  all  nations  and  individuals  hath  branded  with  the 
unchangeable  name  of  meanness.  In  the  list  of  human  vices 
we  find  some  of  such  a  refined  constitution,  they  cannot  bo 
carried  into  practice  without  seducing  some  virtue  to  theii 
assistance ;  but  meanness  hath  neither  alliance  nor  apology. 
It  is  generated  in  the  dust  and  sweepings  of  other  vices,  and 


IHE   CRISIS. 


is  of  such  a  hateful  figure  that  all  the  rest  conspire  to  disown 
it.  Sir  William,  the  commissioner  of  George  the  third,  hath 
at  last  vouchsafed  to  give  it  rank  and  pedigree.  He  has 
placed  the  fugitive  at  the  council  board,  and  dubbed  it  com- 
panion of  the  order  of  knighthood. 

The  particular  act  of  meanness  which  I  allude  to  in  this 
description,  is  forgery.  You,  sir,  have  abetted  and  patronized 
the  forging  and  uttering  counterfeit  continental  bills.  In 
the  same  JNew-York  newspapers  in  which  your  own  pro- 
clamation under  your  master's  authority  was  published, 
offering,  or  pretending  to  offer,  pardon  and  protection  to 
these  states,  there  were  repeated  advertisements  of  counter- 
feit money  for  sale,  and  persons  who  have  come  officially 
from  you,  and  under  the  sanction  of  your  flag,  have  been 
taken  up  in  attempting  to  put  them  off 

A  conduct  so  basely  mean  in  a  public  character  is  with- 
out precedent  or  pretence.  Every  nation  on  earth,  whether 
friends  or  enemies,  will  unite  in  despising  you.  "lis  an  in- 
cendiary war  upon  society,  which  nothing  can  excuse  or 
palliate.  —  An  improvement  upon  beggarly  villany  —  and 
shows  an  imbred  wretchedness  of  heart  made  up  between 
the  venomous  malignity  of  a  serpent  and  a  spiteful  im- 
becility of  an  inferior  reptile. 

The  laws  of  any  civilized  country  would  condemn  you  to 
the  gibbet  without  regard  to  your  rank  or  titles,  because  it 
is  an  action  foreign  to  the  usage  and  custom  of  war  ;  and 
should  you  fall  into  our  hands,  which  pray  God  you  may,  it 
will  be  a  doubtful  matter  whether  we  are  to  consider  you 
as  a  military  prisoner  or  a  prisoner  for  felony. 

Besides,  it  is  exceedingly  unwise  and  impolitic  in  you,  or 
any  other  person  in  the  English  service,  to  promote  or  even 
encourage,  or  wink  at  the  crime  of  forgery,  in  any  case 
whatever.  Because,  as  the  riches  of  England,  as  a  nation, 
are  chiefly  in  paper,  and  the  far  greater  part  of  trade  among 
individuals  is  carried  on  by  the  same  medium,  that  is,  by 
notes  and  drafts  on  one  another,  they,  therefore,  of  all 
people  in  the  world,  ought  to  endeavour  to  keep  forgery  out 
of  sight,  and,  if  possible,  not  to  revive  the  idea  of  it.  It  is 
dangerous  to  make  men  familiar  with  a  crime  which  they 
may  afterwards  practise  to  much  greater  advantage  against 
those  who  first  taught  them.  Several  officers  in  the  English 
army  have  made  their  exit  at  the  gallows  for  forgery  on 
their  agents;  for  we  all  know,  who  know  any  tiling  of 
England,  that  there  is  not  a  more  necessitous  body  of  men, 


THE   CRISIS.  61 

taking  them  generally,  than  what  the  English  officers  are 
They  contrive  to  make  a  show  at  the  expense  of  the  tailors, 
and  appear  clean  at  the  charge  of  the  washer-women. 

England  hath,  at  this  time,  nearly  two  hundred  million 
pounds  sterling  of  public  money  in  paper,  for  which  she 
hath  no  real  property  :  besides  a  large  circulation  of  bank 
notes,  bank  post  bills,  and  promissory  notes  and  drafts  of 
private  bankers,  merchants  and  tradesmen.  She  hath  the 
greatest  quantity  of  paper  currency  and  the  least  quantity 
of  gold  and  silver  of  any  nation  in  Europe ;  the  real  specie 
which  is  about  sixteen  millions  sterling,  serves  only  as  change 
in  large  sums,  which  are  always  made  in  paper,  or  for  pay- 
ment m  small  ones.  Thus  circumstanced,  the  nation  is  put 
to  its  wit's  end,  and  obliged  to  be  severe  almost  to  crimi- 
nality, to  prevent  the  practice  and  growth  .of  forgery. 
Scarcely  a  session  passes  at  the  Old  Bailey,  or  an  execution 
at  Tyburn,  but  witnesseth  this  truth,  yet  you,  sir,  regardless 
of  the  policy  wnich  her  necessity  obliges  ner  to  adopt,  have 
made  your  whole  army  intimate  with  the  crime.  And  as  all 
armies,  at  the  conclusion  of  a  war,  are  too  apt  to  carry  into 
practice  the  vices  of  the  campaign,  it  will  probably  happen, 
that  England  will  hereafter  abound  in  forgeries,  to  which 
art,  the  practitioners  were  first  initiated  under  your  autho- 
rity in  America.  You,  sir,  have  the  honor  of  adding  a  new 
vice  to  the  military  catalogue ;  and  the  reason,  perhaps, 
why  the  invention  was  reserved  for  you,  is,  because  no 
general  before  was  mean  enough  ever  to  think  of  it. 

That  a  man,  whose  soul  is  absorbed  in  the  low  traffic  of 
vulgar  vice,  is  incapable  of  moving  in  any  superior  region, 
is  clearly  shown  in  you  by  the  event  of  every  campaign. 
Your  military  exploits  have  been  without  plan,  object,  or 
decision.  Can  it  be  possible  that  you  or  your  employers 
suppose  that  the  possession  of  Philadelphia  will  be  any 
ways  equal  to  the  expense  or  expectation  of  the  nation 
which  supports  you  ?  What  advantages  does  England  de- 
rive from  any  achievement  of  yours  ?  To  her  it  is  perfectly 
indifferent  what  place  you  are  in,  so  long  as  the  business 
of  conquest  is  unperformed  and  the  charge  of  maintaining 
you  remains  the  same. 

If  the  principal  events  of  the  three  campaigns  be  attended 

to,  the  balance  will  appear  against  you  at  the  close  of  each ; 

but  the  last,  in  point  of  importance  to  us,  has  exceeded  the 

former  two.     It  is  pleasant  to  look  back  on  dangers  past, 

nd  equally  as  pleasant  to  meditate  on  present  ones  when 


62  THE   CRISIS. 

the  way  out  begins  to  appear.  That  period  is  now  arrived, 
and  the  long  doubtful  winter  of  war  is  changing  to  the 
sweeter  prospects  of  victory  and  joy.  At  the  close  of  the 
campaign,  in  1775,  you  were  obliged  to  retreat  from  Boston. 
In  the  summer  of  1776,  you  appeared  with  a  numerous  fleet 
and  army  in  the  harbor  of  New-York.  By  what  miracle 
the  continent  was  preserved  in  that  season  of  danger  is  a 
subject  of  admiration!  If  instead  of  wasting  your  time 
against  Long-Island,  you  had  run  up  the  North  river,  and 
landed  any  where  above  New- York,  the  consequence  must 
have  been,  that  either  you  would  have  compelled  general 
Washington  to  fight  you  with  very  unequal  numbers,  or  he 
must  suddenly  have  evacuated  tne  city  with  the  loss  of 
nearly  all  the  stores  of  his  army,  or  have  surrendered  for 
want  of  provisions ;  the  situation  of  the  place  naturally  pro- 
ducing one  or  the  other  of  these  events. 

The  preparations  made  to  defend  New- York  were,  never- 
theless, wise  and  military ;  because  your  fordfes  were  then  at 
sea,  their  numbers  uncertain  ;  storms,  sickness,  or  a  variety 
of  accidents  might  have  disabled  their  coming,  or  so  dimi- 
nished them  on  their  passage,  that  those  which  survived 
would  have  been  incapable  of  opening  the  campaign  with 
any  prospect  of  success  ;  in  which  case  the  defence  would 
have  been  sufficient  and  the  place  preserved :  for  cities  that 
have  been  raised  from  nothing  with  an  infinitude  of  labor 
and  expense,  are  not  to  be  thrown  away  on  the  bare  proba- 
bility of  their  being  taken.  On  these  grounds  the  prepara- 
tions made  to  maintain  New- York  were  as  judicious  as  the 
retreat  afterwards.  While  you,  in  the  interim,  let  slip  the  very 
opportunity  which  seemed  to  put  conquest  in  your  power. 

Through  the  whole  of  that  campaign  you  had  nearly  dou- 
ble the  forces  which  general  Washington  immediately  com- 
manded. The  principal  plan  at  that  time,  on  our  part,  was 
to  wear  away  the  season  with  as  little  loss  as  possible,  and 
to  raise  the  army  for  the  next  year.  Long-Island,  New- 
York,  forts  Washington  and  Lee  were  not  defended  after 
your  superior  force  was  known,  under  any  expectation  of 
their  being  finally  maintained,  but  as  a  range  of  outworks, 
in  the  attacking  of  which  your  time  might  be  wasted,  your 
numbers  reduced,  and  your  vanity  amused  by  possessing 
them  on  our  retreat.  It  was  intended  to  have  withdrawn  the 
garrison  from  fort  Washington  after  it  had  answered  the  for- 
mer of  those  purposes,  but  the  fate  of  that  day  put  a  prize 
nto  your  hands  without  much  honor  to  yourselves. 


THE   CBI8I8.  6A 

Your  progress  through  the  Jerseys  was  accidental ;  you 
had  it  not  even  in  contemplation,  or  you  would  not  have 
sent  a  principal  part  of  your  forces  to  Rhode-Isand  before 
hand.  The  utmost  hope  of  America  in  the  year  1776, 
reached  no  higher  than  that  she  might  not  then  be  con- 
quered. She  had  no  expectation  of  defeating  you  in  that 
campaign.  Even  the  most  cowardly  tory  allowed,  that, 
could  she  withstand  the  shock  of  that  summer  her  indepen- 
dence would  be  past  a  doubt.  You  had  then  greatly  the 
advantage  of  her.  You  were  formidable.  Your  military 
knowledge  was  supposed  to  be  complete.  Your  fleets  and 
forces  arrived  without  an  accident.  You  had  neither  expe- 
rience nor  reinforcements  to  wait  for.  You  Lad  nothing  to 
do  but  to  begin,  and  your  chance  lay  in  the  first  vigorous 
onset. 

America  was  young  and  unskilled.  She  was  obliged  to 
trust  her  defence  ^to  time  and  practice ;  and  hath,  by  mere 
dint  of  perseverance,  maintained  her  cause,  and  brought  the 
enemy  to  a  condition,  in  which  she  is  now  capable  of  meet- 
ing him  on  any  grounds. 

It  is  remarkable  that  in  the  campaign  of  1776,  you  gained 
no  more,  notwithstanding  your  great  force,  than  what  was 
given  you  by  consent  of  evacuation,  except  fort  Washing- 
ton ;  while  every  advantage  obtained  by  us  was  by  fair  and 
hard  fighting.  The  defeat  of  Sir  Peter  Parker  was  com- 
plete. The  conquest  of  the  Hessians  at  Trenton,  by  the  re- 
mains of  a  retreating  army,  which  but  a  few  days  before 
you  affected  to  despise,  is  an  instance  of  their  heroic  perse- 
verance very  seldom  to  be  met  with.  And  the  victory  over 
the  British  troops  at  Princeton,  by  a  harassed  and  weary 
party,  who  had  been  engaged  the  day  before  and  marched 
all  night  without  refreshment,  is  attended  with  such  a  scene 
of  circumstances  and  superiority  of  generalship,  as  will  ever 
give  it  a  place  in  the  first  rank  in  the  history  of  great  ac- 
tions. 

When  I  look  back  on  the  gloomy  days  of  last  winter,  and 
see  America  suspended  by  a  thread,  I  feel  a  triumph  of  joy 
at  the  recollection  of  her  delivery,  and  -a  reverence  for  the 
characters  which  snatched  her  from  destruction.  To  doubt 
now  would  be  a  species  of  infidelity,  and  to  forget  the  in- 
struments which  saved  us  then  would  be  ingratitude. 

The  close  of  that  campaign  left  us  with  the  spirit  of  con- 
querors. The  northern  districts  were  relieved  by  the 
retreat  of  general  Carleton  over  the  lakes.  The  army  undei 


64  THE   CRISIS. 

your  command  were  hunted  back  and  had  their  bounds  pre- 
scribed. The  continent  began  to  feel  its  military  import- 
ance, and  the  winter  passed  pleasantly  away  in  preparations 
for  the  next  campaign. 

However  confident  you  might  be  on  your  first  arrival,  the 
result  of  the  year  1776  gave  you  some  idea  of  the  difficulty, 
if  not  impossibility  of  conquest.  To  this  reason  I  ascribe 
your  delay  in  opening  the  campaign  of  1777.  The  face  of 
matters,  on  the  close  of  the  former  year,  gave  you  no 
encouragement  to  pursue  a  discretionary  war  as  soon  as  the 
spring  admitted  the  taking  the  field ;  tor  though  conquest, 
ia  that  case,  would  have  given  you  a  double  portion  of  fame, 
yet  the  experiment  was  too  hazardous.  The  ministry,  had 
you  failed,  would  have  shifted  the  whole  blame  upon  you, 
charged  you  with  having  acted  without  orders,  and  con 
demned  at  once  both  your  plan  and  execution. 

To  avoid  the  misfortunes,  which  might  have  involved  you 
and  your  money  accounts  in  perplexity  and  suspicion,  you 
prudently  waited  the  arrival  of  a  plan  of  operations  from 
England,  which  was  that  you  should  proceed  to  Philadelphia 
by  way  of  the  Chesapeake,  and  that  Burgoyne,  after  reduc- 
ing Ticonderoga,  should  take  his  rout  by  Albany,  and,  if 
necessary,  join  you. 

The  splendid  laurels  of  the  last  campaign  have  flourished 
in  the  north.  In  that  quarter  America  nas  surprised  the 
world,  and  laid  the  foundation  of  this  year's  glory.  The 
conquest  of  Ticonderoga,  (if  it  may  be  called  a  conquest) 
has,  like  all  your  other  victories,  led  on  to  ruin.  Even  the 
provisions  taken  in  that  fortress  (which  by  general  Bur- 
goyne's  return  was  sufficient  in  bread  and  flour  for  nearly 
5000  men  for  ten  weeks,  and  in  beef  and  pork  for  the  same 
number  of  men  for  one  month)  served  only  to  hasten  his 
overthrow,  by  enabling  him  to  proceed  to  Saratoga,  the 
place  of  his  destruction.  A  short  review  of  the  operations 
of  the  last  campaign  will  show  the  condition  of  affairs  on 
ooth  sides. 

You  have  taken  Ticonderoga  and  marched  into  Philadel- 
phia. These  are  all  the  events  which  the  year  hath  pro- 
duced on  your  part.  A  trifling  campaign  indeed,  compared 
with  the  expenses  of  England  and  the  conquest  of  the  con- 
tinent. On  the  other  side,  a  considerable  part  of  vour 
northern  force  has  been  routed  by  the  New- York  militia 
under  general  Herkerner.  Fort  Stanwix  has  bravely  sur- 
vived a  compound  attack  of  soldiers  and  savages,  and  the 


THE   CRISIS  05 

besiegers  have  fled.  The  battle  of  Bennington  has  put  a 
thousand  prisoners  into  our  hands,  with  all  their  arms,  stores, 
artillery  and  baggage.  General  Burgoyne,  in  two  engage- 
ments, has  been  defeated ;  himself,  his  army,  and  all  that 
were  his  and  theirs  are  now  ours.  Ticonderoga  and  Inde- 
pendence are  retaken,  and  not  the  shadow  of  an  enemy 
remains  in  all  the  northern  districts.  At  this  instant  we 
have  upwards  of  eleven  thousand  prisoners,  between  sixty 
and  seventy  pieces  of  brass  ordnance,  besides  small  arms, 
tents,  stores,  <xc. 

In  order  to  know  the  real  value  of  those  advantages,  we 
must  reverse  the  scene,  and  suppose  general  Gates  and  the 
force  he  commanded,  to  be  at  your  mercy  as  prisoners,  and 
general  Burgoyne,  with  his  army  of  soldiers  and  savages,  to 
be  already  jojned  to  you  in  Pennsylvania.  So  dismal  a 
picture  can  scarcely  be  looked  at.  It  has  all  the  tracings 
and  colorings  of  horror  and  despair ;  and  excites  the  most 
swelling  emotions  of  gratitude,  by  exhibiting  the  miseries 
we  are  so  graciously  preserved  from. 

I  admire  the  distribution  of  laurels  around  the  continent. 
It  is  the  earnest  of  future  union.  South-Carolina  has  had 
her  day  of  sufferings  and  of  fame ;  and  the  other  southern 
states  have  exerted  themselves  in  proportion  to  the  force 
that  invaded  or  insulted  them.  Towards  the  close  of  the 
campaign,  in  1776,  these  middle  states  were  called  upon 
and  did  their  duty  nobly.  They  were  witnesses  to  the 
almost  expiring  flame  of  human  freedom.  It  was  the  close 
struggle  of  life  and  death.  The  line  of  invisible  division  : 
and  on  which,  the  unabated  fortitude  of  a  Washington  pre- 
vailed, and  saved  the  spark  that  has  since  blazed  in  the 
north  with  unrivalled  lustre. 

Let  me  ask,  sir,  what  great  exploits  have  you  performed  ? 
Through  all  the  variety  of  changes  and  opportunities  which 
the  war  has  produced,  I  know  no  one  action  of  yours  that 
can  be  styled  masterly.  You  have  moved  in  and  out,  back- 
wards and  forwards,  round  and  round,  as  if  valor  consisted 
a  military  jig.  The  history  and  figure  of  your  movements 
would  be  truly  ridiculous  could  they  be  justly  delineated. 
They  resemble  the  labours  of  a  puppy  pursuing  his  tail ;  the 
end  is  still  at  the  same  distance,  and  all  the  turnings  round 
must  be  done  over  again. 

The  first  appearance  of  affairs  of  Ticonderoga  wore  such 
an  unpromising  aspect,  that  it  was  necessary,  in  July,  to 
detach  a  part  of  the  forces  to  the  support  of  that  quarter, 


66  THE   CRISIS. 

which  were  otherwise  destined  or  intended  to  act  against 
you  ;  and  this,  perhaps,  has  been  the  means  of  postponing 
your  downfall  to  another  campaign.  The  destruction  of 
one  army  at  a  time  is  work  enough.  We  know,  sir,  what 
we  are  about,  what  we  have  to  do,  and  how  to  do  it. 

Your  progress  from  the  Chesapeake,  was  marked  by  no 
capital  stroke  of  policy  or  heroism.  Your  principal  aim 
was  to  get  general  Washington  between  the  Delaware  and 
Schuylkill,  and  between  Philadelphia  and  your  army.  In 
that  situation,  with  a  river  on  each  side  of  his  flanks, 
.which  united  about  five  miles  below  the  city,  and  your 
army  above  him,  you  could  have  intercepted  his  reinforce- 
ments and  supplies,  cut  off  all  his  communications  with  the 
country,  and,  if  necessary,  have  despatched  assistance  to 
open  a  passage  for  general  Burgoyne.  This  scheme  was  too 
visible  to  succeed:  for  had  general  Washington  suffered 
you  to  command  the  open  country  above  him,  I  think  it  a 
very  reasonable  conjecture  that  the  conquest  of  Burgoyne 
would  not  have  taken  place,  because  you  could,  in  that  case, 
have  relieved  him.  It  was  therefore  necessary,  while  that 
important  victory  was  in  suspense,  to  trepan  you  into  a 
situation  in  which  you  could  only  be  on  the  defensive,  with- 
out the  power  of  affording  him  assistanse.  The  manoeuvre 
had  its  effect,  and  Burgoyne  was  conquered. 

There  has  been  something  unmilitary  and  passive  in  you 
from  the  time  of  your  passing  the  Schuylkill  and  getting 
possession  of  Philadelphia,  to  the  close  of  the  campaign. 
You  mistook  a  trap  for  a  conquest,  the  probability  of  which 
had  been  made  known  to  Europe,  and  the  edge  of  your 
triumph  taken  off  by  your  own  information  long  before. 

Having  got  you  into  this  situation,  a  scheme  for  a  general 
attack  upon  you  at  Germantown  was  carried  into  execution 
on  the  4th  of  October,  and  though  the  success  was  not  equal 
to  the  excellence  of  the  plan,  yet  the  attempting  it  proved 
the  genius  of  America  to  be  on  the  rise,  and  her  power 
approaching  to  superiority.  The  obscurity  of  the  morning 
was  your  best  friend,  for  a  fog  is  always  favorable  to  a 
hunted  enemy.  Some  weeks  after  this  you  likewise  planned 
an  attack  on  general  Washington,  while  at  WhHemarsh. 
You  marched  out  with  infinite  parade,  but  on  finding 
him  preparing  to  attack  you  next  morning,  you  prudently 
turned  about,  and  retreated  to  Philadelphia  with  all  the 
precipitation  of  a  man  conquered  in  imagination. 

Immediately  after  the  battle  of  Germantown,  the  pro 


THE   CRISIS.  67 

bability  of  Burgoyne's  defeat  gave  a  new  policy  to  affairs 
in  Pennsylvania,  and  it  was  judged  most  consistent  with 
tlie  general  safety  of  America,  to  wait  the  issue  of  the 
northern  campaign.  Slow  and  sure  is  sound  work.  The 
news  of  that  victory  arrived  in  our  camp  on  the  18th  of 
October,  and  no  sooner  did  the  shout  of  joy,  and  the  report 
of  the  thirteen  cannon  reach  your  ears,  than  you  resolved 
upon  a  retreat,  and  the  next  day,  that  is,  the  19th,you  with- 
drew your  drooping  army  into  Philadelphia.  This  move- 
ment was  evidently  dictated  by  fear ;  and  carried  with  it  a 
positive  confession  that  you  dreaded  a  second  attack.  It  was 
hiding  yourself  among  women  and  children,  and  sleeping 
away  the  choicest  part  of  a  campaign  in  expensive  in- 
activity. An  army  in  a  city  can  never  be  a  conquering 
army.  The  situation  admits  only  of  defence.  It  is  mere 
shelter  :  and  every  military  power  in  Europe  will  conclude 
you  to  be  eventually  defeated. 

The  time  when  you  made  this  retreat  was  the  very  time 
vou  ought  to  have  fought  a  battle,  in  order  to  put  yoursell 
in  a  condition  of  recovering  in  Pennsylvania  what  you  had 
lost  in  Saratoga.  And  the  reason  wny  you  did  not,  must 
be  either  prudence  or  cowardice  ;  the  former  supposes  your 
inability,  and  the  latter  needs  no  explanation.  I  draw  no 
conclusions,  sir,  but  such  as  are  naturally  deduced  from 
known  and  visible  facts,  and  such  as  will  always  have  a 
being  while  the  facts  which  produced  them  remain  un- 
altered. 

After  this  retreat  a  new  difficulty  arose  which  exhibited 
the  power  of  Britain  in  a  very  contemptible  light ;  which 
was  the  attack  and  defence  of  Mud-Island.  For  several  weeks 
did  that  little  unfinished  fortress  stand  out  against  all  the 
attempts  of  admiral  and  general  Howe.  It  was  the  fable 
of  Bender  realized  on  the  Delaware.  Scheme  after  scheme, 
and  force  upon  force  were  tried  and  defeated.  The  garrison, 
with  scarce  any  thing  to  cover  them  but  their  bravery,  sur 
vived  in  the  midst  of  mud,  shot  and  shells,  and  were  at  last 
obliged  to  give  it  up  more  to  the  powers  of  time  and  gun- 
powder than  to  military  superiority  of  the  besiegers. 

It  is  my  sincere  opinion  tliat  matters  are  in  a  much  worse 
condition  with  you  than  what  is  generally  known.  Your 
master's  speech  at  the  opening  of  parliament,  is  like  a 
soliloquy  on  ill  luck.  It  shows  him  to  be  coming  a  little  to 
his  reason,  for  sense  of  pain  is  the  first  symptom  of  recovery 
in  profound  stupefaction.  His  condition  is  deplorable.  II« 


68  THE   CRISIS. 

is  obliged  to  submit  to  all  the  insults  of  France  and  Spain, 
without  daring  to  know  or  resent  them ;  and  thankful  for 
the  most  trivial  evasions  to  the  most  humble  remonstrances. 
The  time  was  when  he  could  not  deign  an  answer  to  a 
petition  from  America,  and  the  time  now  is  when  he  dare 
not  give  an  answer  to  an  affront  from  France.  The  capture 
of  Burgoyne's  army  will  sink  his  consequence  as  much  in 
Europe  as  in  America.  In  his  speech  he  expresses  his  suspi- 
cions at  the  warlike  preparations  of  France  and  Spain,  and  as 
he  has  only  the  one  army  which  you  command  to  support  his 
character  in  the  world  with,  it  remains  very  uncertain  when, 
or  in  what  quarter  it  will  be  most  wanted,  or  can  be  best 
employed  ;  and  this  will  partly  account  for  the  great  care 
you  take  to  keep  it  from  action  and  attacks,  for  should 
Burgoyne's  fate  be  yours,  which  it  probably  will,  England 
may  take  her  endless  farewell  not  only  of  all  America  but 
of  all  the  West-Indies. 

Never  did  a  nation  invite  destruction  upon  itself  with  the 
eagerness  and  the  ignorance  with  which  Britain  has  done. 
Bent  upon  the  ruin  of  a  young  and  unoffending  country,  she 
has  drawn  the  sword  that  has  wounded  herself  to  the  heart, 
and  in  the  agony  of  her  resentment  has  applied  a  poison  for 
a  cure.  Her  conduct  towards  America  is  a  compound  of 
rage  and  lunacy ;  she  aims  at  the  government  of  it,  yet 
preserves  neither  dignity  nor  character  in  her  methods  to 
obtain  it.  Were  government  a  mere  manufacture  or  article 
of  commerce,  immaterial  by  whom  it  should  be  made  or 
sold,  we  might  as  well  employ  her  as  another,  but  when  we 
consider  it  as  the  fountain  from  whence  the  general  manners 
and  morality  of  a  country  take  their  rise,  tnat  the  persons 
intrusted  with  the  execution  thereof  are  by  their  serious 
example  and  authority  to  support  these  principles,  how 
abominably  absurd  is  the  idea  of  being  hereafter  governed 
by  a  set  of  men  who  have  been  guilty  of  forgery,  perjury, 
treachery,  theft,  and  every  species  of  villany  which  the  lowest 
wretches  on  earth  could  practise  or  invent.  What  greater 
public  curse  can  befal  any  country  than  to  be  under  such 
authority,  and  what  greater  blessing  than  to  be  delivered 
therefrom.  The  soul  of  any  man  of  sentiment  would  rise  in 
brave  rebellion  against  them,  and  spurn  them  from  the  earth. 

The  malignant  and  venomous  tempered  general  Yaughan 
has  amused  his  savage  fancy  in  burning  the  whole  town  of 
Kingston,  in  York  government,  and  the  late  governor  of 
that  state,  Mr.  Tyron,  in  his  letter  to  general  Parsons,  has 


TUB   CRISIS.  ',.) 

endeavoured  to  justify  it,  and  declared  his  wish  to  burn  the 
houses  of  every  committeeman  in  the  country.  Such  a  con- 
fession from  one  who  was  once  intrusted  witn  the  powers  of 
civil  government,  is  a  reproach  to  the  character.  But  it  is 
the  wish  and  the  declaration  of  a  man,  whom  anguish  and 
disappointment  have  driven  to  despair,  and  who  is  daily 
decaying  into  the  grave  with  constitutional  rottenness. 

There  is  not  in  the  compass  of  language  a  sufficiency  of 
words  to  express  the  baseness  of  your  king,  his  ministry  and 
his  army.  They  have  refined  upon  villany  till  it  wants  a 
name.  To  the  fiercer  vices  of  former  ages  they  have  added 
the  dregs  and  scummings  of  the  most  finished  rascality,  and 
are  so  completely  sunk  in  serpentine  deceit,  that  there  is  not 
left  among  them  one  generous  enemy. 

From  such  men  and  such  masters,  may  the  gracious  hand 
of  Heaven  preserve  America  !  And  though  the  sufferings 
she  now  enaures  are  heavy,  and  severe,  they  are  like  straws 
in  the  wind  compared  to  the  weight  of  evils  she  would  feel 
under  the  government  of  your  king,  and  his  pensioned 
parliament. 

There  is  something  in  meanness  which  excites  a  species  of 
resentment  that  never  subsides,  and  something  in  cruelty 
which  stirs  up  the  heart  to  the  highest  agony  of  human 
hatred ;  Britain  hath  filled  up  both  these  characters  till  no 
addition  can  be  made,  and  hath  not  reputation  left  with  us 
to  obtain  credit  for  the  slightest  promise.  The  will  of  God 
hath  parted  us,  and  the  deed  is  registered  for  eternity. 
When  she  shall  be  a  spot  scarcely  visible  among  the  nations, 
America  shall  flourish  the  favorite  of  heaven,  and  the  friend 
of  mankind. 

For  the  domestic  happiness  of  Britain  and  the  peace  of 
the  world,  I  wish  she  had  not  a  foot  of  land  but  what  is 
circumscribed  within  her  own  island.  Extent  of  dominion 
lias  been  her  ruin,  and  instead  of  civilizing  others  has  bru- 
talized herself.  Her  late  reduction  of  India,  under  Olive  and 
his  successors,  was  not  so  properly  a  conquest  as  an  extermi 
nation  of  mankind.  She  is  the  only  power  who  could 
practise  the  prodigal  barbarity  of  tying  men  to  the  mouths 
of  loaded  cannon  and  blowing  them  away.  It  happens  that 
general  Burgoyne,  who  made  the  report  of  that  horrid 
"ransaction,  in  the  house  of  commons,  is  now  a  prisoner  with 
iis,  and  though  an  enemy,  I  can  appeal  to  him  for  the  truth 
of  it,  being  confident  that  he  neither  can  nor  will  deny  it 
Yot  Clivc  received  the  approbation  of  the  last  parliament. 


70  THE   CRISIS. 

When  we  take  a  survey  of  mankind,  we  cannot  heljD 
cursing  the  wretch,  who,  to  the  unavoidable  misfortunes  oi 
nature,  shall  wilfully  add  the  calamities  of  war.  One  would 
think  there  were  evils  enough  in  the  world  without  studying 
to  increase  them,  and  that  life  is  sufficiently  short  without 
shaking  the  sand  that  measures  it.  The  histories  of  Alex- 
ander, and  Charles  of  Sweden,  are  the  histories  of  human 
devils ;  a  good  man  cannot  think  of  their  actions  without 
abhorrence,  nor  of  their  deaths  without  rejoicing.  To  see 
the  bounties  of  heaven  destroyed,  the  beautiful  face  of 
nature  laid  waste,  and  the  choicest  works  of  creation  and 
art  tumbled  into  ruin,  would  fetch  a  curse  from  the  soul  of 
piety  itself.  But  in  this  country  the  aggravation  is  height- 
ened by  a  new  combination  of  affecting  circumstances. 
America  wa5*  young,  and,  compared  with  other  countries, 
was  virtuous.  _^one  but  a  Herod  of  uncommon  malice 
would  have  made  V.T  upon  infancy  and  innocence:  and 
none  but  a  people  of  the  iiiost  finished  fortitude,  dared  under 
those  circumstances,  have  resisted  the  tyranny.  The  natives, 
or  their  ancestors,  had  fled  from  the  former  oppressions  of 
England,  and  with  the  industry  of  bees  had  changed  a  wil- 
derness into  a  habitable  world.  To  Britain  they  were 
indebted  for  nothing.  The  country  was  the  gift  of  heaven, 
and  God  alone  is  their  Lord  and  Sovereign. 

The  time,  sir,  will  come  when  you,  in  a  melancholy  houi, 
shall  reckon  up  your  miseries  by  your  murders  in  America. 
Life,  with  you,  begins  to  wear  a  clouded  aspect.  The  vision 
of  pleasurable  delusion  is  wearing  away,  and  changing  to 
the  barren  wild  of  age  and  sorrow.  The  poor  reflection  of 
having  served  your  king  will  yield  you  no  consolation  in 
your  parting  moments.  He  will  crumble  to  the  same  undis- 
tinguished ashes  with  yourself,  and  have  sins  enough  of  his 
own  to  answer  for.  It  is  not  the  farcial  benedictions  of  a 
bishop,  nor  the  cringing  hypocrisy  of  a  court  of  chaplains, 
nor  the  formality  of  an  act  of  parliament,  that  can  change 
guilt  into  innocence,  or  make  the  punishment  one  pang  the 
less.  You  may,  perhaps,  be  unwilling  to  be  serious,  but  this 
destruction  of  the  goo.ds  of  Providence,  this  havoc  of  the 
human  race,  and  this  sowing  the  world  with  mischief,  must 
be  accounted  for  to  him  who  made  and  governs  it.  To  us 
they  are  only  present  sufferings,  but  to  him  they  are  deep 
rebellions. 

If  there  is  a  sin  superior  to  every  other,  it  is  that  of  wilful 

/¥%  f 

and  offensive  wa"r.     Most  other  sins  are  circumscribed  withiu 


THE   CRISIS.  71 

narrow  limits,  that  is,  the  power  of  one  man  cannot  give 
them  a  very  general  extension,  and  many  kinds  of  sins  have 
only  a  mental  existence  from  which  no  infection  arises ;  but 
he  who  is  the  author  of  a  war,  lets  loose  the  whole  contagion 
of  hell,  and  opens  a  vein  that  bleeds  a  nation  to  death.  W^e 
leave  it  to  England  and  Indians  to  boast  of  these  honors ; 
we  feel  no  thirst  for  such  savage  glory ;  a  nobler  fame,  a 
purer  spirit  animates  America.  She  has  taken  up  the  sword 
of  virtuous  defence ;  she  has  bravely  put  herself  between 
Tyranny  and  Freedom,  between  a  curse  and  a  blessing, 
determined  to  expel  the  one  and  protect  the  other. 

It  is  the  object  only  of  war  mat  makes  it  honourable. 
Aid  if  there  was  ever  a  just  war  since  the  world  began,  it 
is  this  in  which  America  is  now  engaged.  She  invaded  no 
land  of  yours.  She  hired  no  mercenaries  to  burn  your 
towns,  nor  Indians  to  massacre  their  inhabitants.  She 
wanted  nothing  from  you,  and  was  indebted  for  nothing  to 
you :  and  thus  circumstanced,  her  defence  is  honorable  and 
herposterity  is  certain. 

Yet  it  is  not  on  the  justice  only,  but  likewise  on  the 
importance  of  this  cause  that  I  ground  my  seeming  enthusi- 
astical  confidence  of  our  success.  The  vast  extension  of 
America  makes  her  of  too  much  value  in  the  scale  of  Provi- 
dence, to  be  cast,  like  a  pearl  before  swine,  at  the  feet  of  an 
European  island ;  and  of  much  less  consequence  would  it  be 
that  Britain  were  sunk  in  the  sea  than  that  America  should 
miscarry.  There  has  been  such  a  chain  of  extraordinary 
•events  in  the  discovery  of  this  country  at  first,  in  the  peop- 
ling and  planting  it  afterwards,  in  the  rearing  and  nursing 
it  to  its  present  state,  and  in  the  protection  of  it  through  the 
present  war,  that  no  man  can  doubt,  but  Providence  hath 
some  nobler  end  to  accomplish,  than  the  gratification  of  the 
petty  elector  of  Hanover,  or  the  ignorant  and  insignificant 
ting  of  Britain. 

As  the  blood  of  the  martyrs  hath  been  the  seed  of  ^he 
Christian  church,  so  the  political  persecutions  of  England 
will  and  has  already  enriched  America  with  industry, 
experience,  union,  and  importance.  Before  the  present  era 
she  was  a  mere  cilaos  of  uncemented  colonies,  individually 
exposed  to  the  ravages  of  the  Indians  and  the  invasion  oi 
any  power  that  Britain  should  be  at  war  with.  She  had 
nothing  that  she  could  call  her  own.  Her  felicity  depended 
upon  accident.  The  convulsions  of  Europe  might  have 
thrown  her  from  one  conqueror  to  another,  till  she  nad  boon 


72  THE   CRISIS. 

the  slave  of  all,  and  ruined  by  every  one  ;  for  until  she  had 
spirit  enough  to  become  her  own  master,  there  was  no 
knowing  to  which  master  she  should  belong.  That  period, 
thank  God,  is  past,  and  she  is  no  longer  the  dependant,  dis- 
united colonies  of  Britain,  but  the  Independent  and  United 
States  of  America,  knowing  no  master  but  heaven  and  her- 
self. You,  or  your  king,  may  call  this  "  delusion,"  "  rebel- 
lion," or  what  name  you  please.  To  us  it  is  perfectly 
indifferent.  The  issue  will  determine  the  character,  and 
time  will  give  it  a  name  as  lasting  as  his  own. 

You  have  now,  sir,  tried  the  fate  of  three  campaigns,  and 
can  fully  declare  to  England,  that  nothing  is  to  be  got  on 
your  part,  but  blows  and  broken  bones,  and  nothing  on  hers 
but  waste  of  trade  and  credit,  and  an  increase  of  poverty 
and  taxes.  You  are  now  only  where  you  might  have  been 
two  years  ago,  without  the  loss  of  a  single  ship,  and  yet  not 
a  step  more  forward  towards  the  conquest  of  the  continent  ; 
because,  as  I  have  already  hinted,  "  an  army  in  a  city  can 
never  be  a  conquering  army."  The  full  amount  of  your 
losses,  since  the  beginning  of  the  war,  exceeds  twenty 
thousand  men,  besides  millions  of  treasure,  for  which  you 
have  nothing  in  exchange.  Our  expenses,  though  great, 
are  circulated  within  ourselves.  Yours  is  a  direct  sinking  of 
money,  and  that  from  both  ends  at  once ;  first,  in  hiring 
troops  out  of  the  nation,  and  in  paying  them  afterwards, 
because  the  money  in  neither  case  can  return  to  Britain. 
We  are  already  in  possession  of  the  prize,  you  only  in 
pursuit  of  it.  To  us  it  is  a  real  treasure,  to  you  it  would  be 
only  an  empty  triumph.  Our  expenses  will  repay  them- 
selves with  tenfold  interest,  while  yours  entail  upon  you 
everlasting  poverty. 

Take  a  review,  sir,  of  the  ground  which  you  have  gone 
over,  and  let  it  teach  you  policy,  if  it  cannot  honesty.  You 
stand  but  on  a  very  tottering  foundation.  A  change  of  the 
ministry  in  England  may  probably  bring  your  measures 
into  question,  and  your  head  to  the  block.  Olive,  with  all 
his  successes,  had  some  difficulty  in  escaping,  and  youre 
being  all  a  war  of  losses,  will  afford  you  less  pretensions, 
and  your  enemies  more  grounds  for  impeachment. 

Go  home,  sir,  and  endeavour  to  save  the  remains  of  your 
ruined  country,  by  a  just  representation  of  the  madness  of 
her  measures.  A  few  moments,  well  applied,  may  yet 
preserve  her  from  political  destruction.  I  am  not  one  of 
those  who  wish  to  see  Euro  IT  i.-i  &  flame,  because  I  am 


THE   CRISIS.  78 

persuaded  that  such  an  event  will  not  shorten  the  war.  The 
rupture,  at  present,  is  confined  between  the  two  powers  of 
America  and  England.  England  finds  that  she  cannot 
conquer  America,  and  America  has  no  wish  to  conquer 
England.  You  are  fighting  for  what  you  can  never  obtain, 
and  we  are  defending  what  we  never  mean  to  part  with.  A 
few  words,  therefore,  settle  the  bargain.  Let  England  mind 
her  own  business  and  we  will  mind  ours.  Govern  your- 
selves, and  we  will  govern  ourselves.  You  may  then  trade 
where  you  please  unmolested  by  us,  and  we  will  trade  where 
we  please  unmolested  by  you  ;  and  such  articles  as  we  can 
purchase  of  each  other  better  than  elsewhere  may  be 
mutually  done.  If  it  were  possible  that  you  could  carry  on 
the  war  for  twenty  years  you  must  still  come  to  this  point 
at  last,  or  worse,  and  the  sooner  you  think  of  it  the  better  i* 
will  be  for  you. 

My  official  situation  enables  me  to  know  the  repeated 
insults  which  Britain  is  obliged  to  put  up  with  from  foreign 
powers,  and  the  wretched  shifts  that  she  is  driven  to,  to  gloss 
them  over.  Her  reduced  strength  and  exhausted  coffers  in 
a  three  years'  war  with  America,  hath  given  a  powerful 
superiority  to  France  and  Spain.  She  is  not  now  a  match 
for  them.  But  if  neither  councils  can  prevail  on  her  to 
think,  nor  sufferings  awaken  her  to  reason,  she  must  e'en  go 
on,  till  the  honour  of  England  becomes  a  proverb  of  con- 
tempt, and  Europe  dub  her  the  Land  of  Fools. 

I  am,  Sir,  with  every  wish  for  an  honourable  peace, 
Your  friend,  enemy,  and  countryman, 

(JOMMON  SENSE. 

TO  THE  INHABITANTS  OF  AMERICA. 

WITH  all  the  pleasure  with  which  a  man  exchanges  baa 
company  for  good,  I  take  my  leave  of  Sir  William  ana  return 
to  you.  It  is  now  nearly  three  years  since  the  tyranny  of 
Britain  received  its  first  repulse  by  the  arms  of  America. 
A  perio I  which  has  given  birth  to  a  new  world,  and  erected 
a  monument  to  the  folly  of  the  old. 

I  cannot  help  being  sometimes  surprised  at  the  compli- 
mentary references  which  I  have  seen  and  heard  made  to 
ancient  histories  and  transactions.  The  wisdom,  civil  gov- 
ernments, and  sense  of  honor  of  the  states  of  Greece  and 
Rome,  are  frequently  held  up  as  objects  of  excellence  and 
imitation.  Mankind  have  lived  to  very  little  purpose,  if,  at 


THE   CRISIS. 


this  period  of  the  world,  they  must  go  two  or  three  thousand 
years  back  for  lessons  and  examples.  We  do  ^reat  injustice 
to  ourselves  by  placing  them  in  such  a  superior  line.  We 
have  no  just  authority  for  it,  neither  can  we  tell  why  it  is- 
that  we  should  suppose  ourselves  inferior. 

Could  the  mist  of  antiquity  be  cleared  away,  and  men  and 
things  be  viewed  as  they  really  were,  it  is  more  than  proba- 
ble that  they  would  admire  us,  rather  than  we  them.  America 
has  surmounted  a  greater  variety  and  combination  of  diffi- 
culties, than,  I  believe,  ever  fell  to  the  share  of  any  one 
people,  in  the  same  space  of  time,  and  has  replenished  the 
world  with  more  useful  knowledge  and  sounder  maxims  of 
civil  government  than  were  ever  produced  in  any  age  before. 

Had  it  not  been  for  America,  there  had  been  no  such 
thing  as  freedom  left  throughout  the  whole  universe.  Eng- 
land hath  lost  hers  in  a  long  chain  of  right  reasoning  from 
wrong  principles,  and  it  is  from  this  country,  now,  that  she 
must  learn  the  resolution  to  redress  herself,  and  the  wisdom 
how  to  accomplish  it. 

The  Grecians  and  Romans  were  strongly  possessed  of  the 
spirit  of  liberty  but  not  the  principle,  K>r  at  the  time  that 
they  were  determined  not  to  be  slaves  themselves,  they 
employed  their  power  to  enslave  the  rest  of  mankind.  But 
this  distinguished  era  is  blotted  by  no  one  misanthropical 
vice.  In  short,  if  the  principle  on  which  the  cause  is  found- 
ed, the  universal  blessings  that  are  to  arise  from  it,  the  diffi- 
culties that  accompanied  it,  the  wisdom  with  which  it  has 
been  debated,  the  fortitude  by  which  it  has  been  supported, 
the  strength  of  the  power  which  we  had  to  oppose,  and  the 
condition  in  which  we  undertook  it,  be  all  taken  in  one  view, 
we  may  justly  style  it  the  most  virtuous  and  illustrious  revo- 
lution that  ever  graced  the  history  of  mankind. 

A  good  opinion  of  ourselves  is  exceedingly  necessary  in 
private  life,  but  absolutely  necessary  in  public  life,  and  of 
the  utmost  importance  in  supporting  national  character.  I 
have  no  notion  of  yielding  the  palm  of  the  United  3tates  to 
any  Grecians  or  Romans  that  were  ever  born.  We  have 
equalled  the  bravest  in  times  of  danger,  and  excelled  the 
wisest  *in  construction  of  civil  governments. 

From  this  agreeable  eminence  let  us  take  a  review  of 
present  affairs.  The  spirit  of  corruption  is  so  inseparably 
interwoven  with  British  politics,  that  their  ministry  suppose 
all  mankind  are  governed  by  the  same  motives.  They  have 
no  idea  of  a  people  submitting  even  to  temporary  inconve- 


THE   CRISIS.  75 

nience  from  an  attachment  to  rights  and  privileges.  Theii 
plans  of  business  are  calculated  try  the  hour  and/ar  the  hour, 
and  are  uniform  in  nothing  but  the  corruption  which  gives 
them  birth.  They  never  had,  neither  have  they  at  this  time, 
any  regular  plan  for  the  conquest  of  America  by  arms.  They 
known  not  now  to  go  about  it,  neither  have  they  power  to 
effect  it  if  they  did  know.  The  thing  is  not  within  the  com- 
pass of  human  practicability,  for  America  is  too  extensive 
either  to  be  fully  conquered  or  passively  defended.  But  she 
may  be  actively  defended  by  defeating  or  making  prisoners 
of  the  army  that  invades  her.  And  mis  is  the  only  system 
of  defence  that  can  be  effectual  in  a  large  country. 

There  is  something  in  a  war  carried  on  by  invasion  which 
makes  it  differ  in  circumstances  from  any  other  mode  of 
war,  because  he  who  conducts  it  cannot  tell  whether  the 
ground  he  gains  be  for  him,  or  against  him,  when  he  first 
f  btains  it.  In  the  winter  of  1776,  general  Howe  marched 
with  an  air  of  victory  through  the  Jerseys,  the  consequence 
of  which  was  his  defeat ;  and  general  Burgoyne  at  Saratoga 
experienced  the  same  fate  from  the  same  cause.  The  Span- 
iards, about  two  years  ago,  were  defeated  by  the  Algerines 
in  the  same  manner,  that  is,  their  first  triumphs  became  a  trap 
in  which  they  were  totally  routed.  And  whoever  will  attend 
to  the  circumstances  and  events  of  a  war  carried  on  by 
invasion,  will  find,  that  any  invader,  in  order  to  be  finally 
conquered  must  first  begin  to  conquer. 

I  confess  myself  one  of  those  who  believe  the  loss  of  Phila- 
delphia to  be  attended  with  more  advantages  than  injuries. 
The  case  stood  thus :  The  enemy  imagined  Philadelphia  to 
be  of  more  importance  to  us  than  it  really  was  ;  for  we  all 
know  that  it  had  long  ceased  to  be  a  port ;  not  a  cargo  of 
goods  had  been  brought  into  it  for  near  a  twelvemonth,  nor 
any  fixed  manufactories,  nor  even  ship-building,  carried  on 
in  it ;  yet  as  the  enemy  believed  the  conquest  of  it  to  be 
practicable,  and  to  that  belief  added  the  absurd  idea  that 
the  soul  of  all  America  was  centred  there,  and  would  be 
conquered  there,  it  naturally  follows  that  their  possession  of 
it,  by  not  answering  the  end  proposed,  must  break  up  the 
plans  they  had  so  foolishly  gone  upon,  and  either  oblige 
them  to  form  a  new  one,  for  which  tneir  present  strength  ig 
not  sufficient,  or  to  give  over  the  attempt. 

We  never  had  so  small  an  army  to  fight  against,  nor  so 
fair  an  opportunity  of  final  success  as  now.  The  death 
wound  is  already  given.  The  day  is  ours  if  we  follow  it  up 


76  THE   CRISIS. 

The  enemy,  by  his  situation,  is  within  our  reach,  and  by  his 
reduced  strength  is  within  our  power.  The  ministers  of 
Britain  may  rage  as  they  please,  but  our  part  is  to  conquer 
their  armies.  Let  them  wrangle  and  welcome,  but  let  it 
not  draw  our  attention  from  the  one  thing  needful.  Herey 
in  this  spot  is  our  own  business  to  be  accomplished,  our  felicity 
secured.  What  we  have  now  to  do  is  as  clear  as  light,  and 
the  way  to  do  it  is  as  straight  as  a  line.  It  needs  not  to  be 
commented  upon,  yet,  in  order  to  be  perfectly  understood  I 
will  put  a  case  that  cannot  admit  of  a  mistake. 

Had  the  armies  under  generals  Howe  and  Burgoyne  been 
united,  and  taken  post  at  Germantown,  and  had  the  north- 
ern army  under  general  Gates  been  joined  to  that  under 
feueral  Washington,  at  Whitemarsh,  the  consequence  would 
ave  been  a  general  action  ;  and  if  in  that  action  we  had 
killed  and  taken  the  same  number  of  officers  and  men,  that 
is,  between  nine  and  ten  thousand,  with  the  same  quantity 
of  artillery,  arms,  stores,  etc.  as  have  been  taken  at  the 
northward,  and  obliged  general  Howe  with  the  remains  of 
his  army,  that  is,  with  the  same  number  he  now  commands, 
to  take  shelter  in  Philadelphia,  we  should  certainly  have 
thought  ourselves  the  greatest  heroes  in  the  world ;  and 
should,  as  soon  as  the  season  permitted,  have  collected 
together  all  the  force  of  the  continent  and  laid  siege  to  the 
city,  for  it  requires  a  much  greater  force  to  besiege  an  enemy 
in  a  town  than  to  defeat  him  in  the  field.  The  case  now  is 
just  the  same  as  if  it  had  been  produced  by  the  means  I 
nave  here  supposed.  Between  nine  and  ten  thousand  have 
been  killed  and  taken,  all  their  stores  are  in  our  possession,  and 

general  Howe,  in  consequence  of  that  victory,  has  thrown 
imself  for  shelter  into  Philadelphia.  He,  or  his  trifling  friend 
Galloway,  may  form  what  pretences  they  please,  yet  no  just 
reason  can  be  given  for  their  going  into  winter  quarters  so 
early  as  the  19th  of  October,  but  their  apprehensions  of  a 
defeat  if  they  continued  out,  or  their  conscious  inability  of 
keeping  the  field  with  safety.  I  see  no  advantage  which  can 
arise  to  America  by  hunting  the  enemy  from  state  to  state. 
It  is  a  triumph  without  a  prize,  and  wholly  unworthy  the 
attention  of  a  people  determined  to  conquer.  Neither  can 
any  state  promise  itself  security  while  the  enemy  remains 
in  a  condition  to  transport  themselves  from  one  part  of  the 
continent  to  another.  Howe,  likewise,  cannot  conquer  where 
we  have  no  army  to  oppose,  therefore  any  such  removals  in 
him  are  mean  and  cowardly,  and  reduces  Britain  to  a 


THE   CRISIS.  77 

common  pilferer.  If  he  retreats  from  Philadelphia,  he  will 
be  despised  ;  if  he  stays,  he  may  be  shut  up  ana  starved  out, 
and  the  country,  if  he  adyances  into  it,  may  become  his 
Saratoga.  He  has  his  choice  of  evils  and  we  of  opportuni- 
ties. &  he  moves  early,  it  is  not  only  a  sign  but  a  proof 
that  he  expects  no  reinforcement,  and  nis  delay  will  provo 
that  he  either  waits  for  the  arrival  of  a  plan  to  go  upon,  or 
force  to  execute  it,  or  both  ;  in  which  case  our  strength  will 
increase  more  than  his,  therefore  in  any  case  we  cannot  be 
wrong  if  we  do  but  proceed. 

The  particular  condition  of  Pennsylvania  deserves  the 
attention  of  all  the  other  states.  Her  military  strength  must 
not  be  estimated  by  the  number  of  inhabitants.  Here  are 
men  of  all  nations,  characters,  professions  and  interests. 
Here  are  the  firmest  whigs,  surviving,  like  sparks  in  the 
ocean,  unquenched  and  uncooled  in  the  midst  01  discourage- 
ment and  disaffection.  Here  are  men  losing  their  all  with 
cheerfulness,  and  collecting  fire  and  fortitude  from  the  flames 
of  their  own  estates.  Here  are  others  skulking  in  secret, 
many  making  a  market  of  the  times,  and  numbers  who  are 
changing  to  whig  or  tory  with  the  circumstances  of  every 
day. 

it  is  by  mere  dint  of  fortitude  and  perseverance  that  the 
whigs  of  this  state  have  been  able  to  maintain  so  good  a 
countenance,  and  do  even  what  they  have  done.  'We  want 
help,  and  the  sooner  it  can  arrive  the  more  effectual  it  will 
be.  The  invaded  state,  be  it  which  it  may,  will  always  feel 
an  additional  burden  upon  its  back,  and  be  hard  set  to  sup- 
port its  civil  power  witn  sufficient  authority  :  and  this  dlf- 
nculty  will  rise  or  fall,  in  proportion  as  the  other  states 
throw  in  their  assistance  to  the  common  caase. 

The  enemy  will  most  probably  make  many  manoeuvres  at 
the  opening  of  this  campaign,  to  amuse  and  draw  off  the 
attention  of  the  several  states  from  the  one  thing  needful. 
"We  may  expect  to  hear  of  alarms  and  pretended  expeditions 
to  this  place  and  that  place,  to  the  southward,  the  eastward, 
and  the  northward,  all  intended  to  prevent  our  forming  into 
one  formidable  body.  The  less  the  enemy's  strength  is,  the 
more  subtleties  of  this  kind  will  they  make  use  of.  Their 
existence  depends  upon  it,  because  the  force  of  America, 
when  collected,  is  sufficient  to  swallow  their  present  army 
up.  It  is  therefore  our  business  to  make  short  work  of  it, 
by  bending  our  whole  attention  to  this  one  principal  point, 
for  the  instant  that  the  main  body  under  general  Howe  is 


T8  THE   CRISIS. 

defeated,  all  the  inferior  alarms  throughout  the  continent, 
like  so  many  shadows,  will  follow  his  downfall. 

The  only  way  to  finish  a  war  with  the  least  possible 
bloodshed,  or  perhaps  without  any,  is  to  collect  an  army, 
against  the  power  of  which  the  enemy  shall  have  no  chance. 
By  not  doing  this,  we  prolong  the  war,  and  double  both  the 
calamities  and  expenses  of  it.  What  a  rich  and  happy 
country  would  America  be,  were  she,  by  a  vigorous  exer- 
tion, to  reduce  Howe  as  she  has  reduced  Burgoyne.  Her 
currency  would  rise  to  millions  beyond  its  present  value. 
Every  man  would  be  rich,  and  every  man  would  have  it  in 
his  power  to  be  happy.  And  why  not  do  these  things  ? 
What  is  there  to  hinder  ?  America  is  her  own  mistress,  and 
can  do  what  she  pleases. 

If  we  had  not  at  this  time  a  man  in  the  field,  we  could, 
nevertheless,  raise  an  army  in  a  few  weeks  sufficient  to  over- 
whelm all  the  force  which  general  Howe  at  present  com- 
mands. Vigor  and  determination  will  do  any  thing  and 
every  thing.  We  began  the  war  with  this  kind  of  spirit, 
why  not  end  it  with  the  same  ?  Here,  gentlemen,  is  the 
enemy.  Here  is  the  army.  The  interest,  the  happiness  of 
all  America,  is  centred  in  this  half  ruined  spot.  Come  and 
help  us.  Here  are  laurels,  come  and  share  them.  Here  are 
tones,  come  and  help  us  to  expel  them.  Here  are  whigs 
that  will  make  you  welcome,  and  enemies  that  dread  your 
coming. 

The  worst  of  all  policy  is  that  of  doing  things  by  halves. 
Penny  wise  and  pound  foolish,  has  been  the  ruin  of  thou- 
sands. The  present  spring,  if  rightly  improved,  will  free  us 
from  all  troubles,  and  save  us  the  expense  of  millions.  We 
have  now  only  one  army  to  cope  with.  No  opportunity  can 
be  fairer ;  no  prospect  more  promising.  I  shall  conclude 
this  paper  with  a  few  outlines  of  a  plan,  either  for  filling  up 
the  battalions  with  expedition,  or  for  raising  an  additional 
force,  for  any  limited  time,  on  any  sudden  emergency. 

That  in  which  every  man  is  interested,  is  every  man's 
duty  to  support.  And  any  burden  which  falls  equally  on 
all  men,  and  from  which  every  man  is  to  receive  an  equal 
benefit,  is  consistent  with  the  most  perfect  ideas  of  liberty. 
I  would  wish  to  revive  something  of  that  virtuous  ambition 
which  first  called  America  into  the  field.  Then  every  man 
was  eager  to  do  his  part,  and  perhaps  the  principal  reason 
why  we  have  in  any  degree  fallen  therefrom,  is,  because  we 
did  not  set  a  right  value  by  it  at  first,  but  left  it  to  blaze 


THE   CRISIS.  79 

out  of  itself,  instead  of  regulating  and  preserving  it  by  just 
proportions  of  rest  and  service. 

Suppose  any  state  whose  numb«r  of  effective  inhabitants 
was  80,000,  should  be  required  to  furnish  3,200  men  towards 
the  defence  of  the  continent  on  any  sudden  emergency. 

1st,  Let  the  whole  number  of  effective  inhabitants  be 
divided  into  hundreds ;  then  if  each  of  those  hundreds  turn 
out  four  men,  the  whole  number  of  3,200  will  be  had. 

2d,  Let  the  name  of  each  hundred  men  be  entered  in  a 
book,  and  let  four  dollars  be  collected  from  each  man,  with 
as  much  more  as  any  of  the  gentlemen,  whose  abilities  can 
afford  it,  shall  please  to  throw  in,  which  gifts  likewise  shall 
be  entered  against  the  names  of  the  donors. 

3d,  Let  the  sums  so  collected  be  offered  as  a  present,  over 
and  above  the  bounty  of  twenty  dollars,  to  any  four  who 
may  be  inclined  to  propose  themselves  as  volunteers:  if 
more  than  four  offer,  the  majority  of  the  subscribers  present 
shall  determine  which :  if  none  offer,  then  four  out  of  the 
nundred  shall  be  taken  bv  lot,  who  shall  be  entitled  to 
the  sa.id  sums,  and  shall  either  go,  or  provide  others  that 
will,  in  the  space  of  MX  days. 

4th,  As  it  will  always  happen,  that  in  the  space  of  ground 
on  which  an  hundred  men  shall  live,  there  will  be  always  a 
number  of  persons  who,  by  age  and  infirmity,  are  incapable 
of  doing  personal  service,  and  as  such  persons  are  generally 
possessed  of  the  greatest  part  of  the  property  in  any  country, 
their  portion  of  service,  therefore,  will  be  to  furnish  each 
man  with  a  blanket,  which  will  make  a  regimental  coat, 
jacket,  and  breeches,  or  clothes  in  lieu  thereof,  and  another 
for  a  watch  cloak,  and  two  pair  of  shoes ;  for  however  choice 
people  may  be  of  these  things  matters  not  in  cases  of  this 
kind ;  those  who  live  always  in  houses  can  find  many  ways 
to  keep  themselves  warm,  but  it  is  a  shame  and  a  sin  to  suf- 
fer a  soldier  in  the  field  to  want  a  blanket  while  there  is  one 
in  the  country. 

Should  the  clothing  not  be  wanted,  the  superannuated  01 
infirm  persons  possessing  property,  mav,  in  lieu  thereof,  throw 
in  their  money  subscriptions  towards  increasing  the  bounty  ; 
for  though  age  will  naturally  exempt  a  person  from  personal 
service,  it  cannot  exempt  him  from  his  share  of  the  charge, 
because  the  men  are  raised  for  the  defence  of  property  and 
liberty  jointly. 

There  never  was  a  scheme  against  which  objections  might 
not  be  raised.  But  thi*  alone  is  not  a  sufficient  reason  fur 


50  FHE   CRISIS. 

rejection.  The  only  line  to  judge  truly  upon,  is  to  draw  out 
and  admit  all  the  objections  which  can  fairly  be  made,  and 
place  against  them  all  the  contrary  qualities,  conveniences 
and  advantages,  then  by  striking  a  balance  you  come  at  the 
true  character  of  any  scheme,  principle  or  position. 

The  most  material  advantages  of  the  plan  here  proposed 
are,  ease,  expedition,  and  cheapness ;  yet  the  men  so  raised 
get  a  much  larger  bounty  than  is  any  where  at  present 
given ;  because  all  the  expenses,  extravagance,  and  conse- 
quent idleness  of  recruiting  are  saved  or  prevented.  The 
country  incurs  no  new  debt  nor  interest  thereon ;  the  whole 
matter  being  all  settled  at  once  and  entirely  done  with.  It 
is  a  subscription  answering  all  the  purposes  of  a  tax,  with- 
out either  the  charge  or  trouble  of  collecting.  The  men  are 
ready  for  the  field  with  the  greatest  possible  expedition, 
because  it  becomes  the  duty  of  the  inhabitants  themselves, 
in  every  part  of  the  country,  to  find  their  proportion  of  men, 
instead  of  leaving  it  to  a  recruiting  sergeant,  who,  be  he 
ever  so  industrious,  cannot  know  always  where  to  apply. 

I  do  not  propose  this  as  a  regular  digested  plan,  neither 
will  the  limits  of  this  paper  admit  of  any  further  remarks 
upon  it.  I  believe  it  to  be  a  hint  capable  of  much  improve- 
ment, and  as  such  submit  it  to  the  public. 

COMMON  SENSE. 

Lancaster,  March  21,  1T78. 


KUMBEK  VL 

TO  THE  EAEL  OF  CARLISLE,  GENERAL  CLINTON,  AND  WIL 
LIAM  EDEN,  ESQ.,  BRITISH  COMMISSIONERS,  AT  NEW- 
YORK. 

THERE  is  a  dignity  in  the  warm  passions  of  a  whig,  which 
is  never  to  be  found  in  the  cold  malice  of  a  tory.  In  the 
one  nature  is  only  heated — in  the  other  she  is  poisoned. 
The  instant  the  former  has  it  in  his  power  to  punish,  he  feels 
a  disposition  to  forgive ;  but  the  canine  venom  of  the  latter 
knows  no  relief  but  revenge.  This  general  distinction  will, 
I  believe,  apply  in  all  cases,  and  suit  as  well  the  meridian  , 
of  England  as  America. 

As  I  presume  your  last  proclamation  wTi  undergo  the 


THE   OBI8I8.  81 

itrictures  of  other  pens,  I  shall  confine  my  remarks  to  only 
a  few  parts  thereof.  All  that  you  have  said  might  have 
been  comprised  in  half  the  compass.  It  is  tedious  and 
unmeaning,  and  only  a  repetition  of  your  former  follies,  with 
here  and  there  an  offensive  aggravation.  Your  cargo  of 
pardons  will  have  no  market — It  is  unfashionable  to  look  at 
them — even  speculation  is  at  an  end.  They  have  become  a 
perfect  drug,  and  no  way  calculated  for  the  climate. 

In  the  course  of  your  proclamation  you  say,  "  The  policy 
as  well  as  the  benevolence  of  Great  Britain  have  thus  far 
checked  the  extremes  of  war,  when  they  tended  to  distress  a 

Eeople  still  considered  as  their  fellow  subjects,  and  to  deso- 
ite  a  country  shortly  to  become  again  a  source  of  mutual 
advantage."  What  you  mean  by  "  the  benevolence  of  Great 
Britain  is  to  me  inconceivable.  To  put  a  plain  question ; 
do  you  consider  yourselves  men  or  devils  ?  For  until  this 
point  is  settled,  no  determinate  sense  can  be  put  upon  the 
expression.  You  have  already  equalled,  and  in  many  cases 
excelled,  the  savages  of  either  Indies ;  and  if  you  have  yet 
a  cruelty  in  store  you  must  have  imported  it,  unmixed  with 
every  human  material,  from  the  original  warehouse  of  hell. 
To  the  interposition  of  Providence,  and  her  blessings  on 
our  endeavours,  and  not  to  British  benevolence,  are  we 
indebted  for  the  short  chain  that  limits  your  ravages. 
Remember  you  do  not  at  this  time,  command  a  foot  of  land 
on  the  continent  of  America.  Staten-Island,  York-Island,  a 
small  part  of  Long-Island,  and  Rhode-Island,  circumscribe 
your  power ;  and  even  those  you  hold  at  the  expense  of  the 
West-Indies.  To  avoid  a  defeat,  or  prevent  a  desertion  of 
your  troops,  you  have  taken  up  your  quarters  in  holes  and 
corners  of  inaccessible  security ;  and  in  order  to  conceal 
what  every  one  can  perceive,  you  now  endeavour  to  impose 
your  weakness  upon  us  for  an  act  of  mercy.  If  you  think 
to  succeed  by  such  shadowy  devices,  you  are  but  infants  in 
the  political  world ;  you  have  the  A,  B,  C,  of  stratagem  yet 
to  learn.,  and  are  wholly  ignorant  ot  the  people  you  have 
to  contend  witn.  Like  men  in  a  state  of  intoxication,  you 
forget  that  the  rest  of  the  world  have  eyes,  and  that  the 
same  stupidity  which  conceals  you  from  yourselves  exposes 
yon  to  their  satire  and  contempt. 

The  Darap raph  which  I  have  quoted,  stands  as  an  intro- 
duction to  the  following :  "  But  when  that  country  (America) 
1  pro'eofte.*  the  unnatural  design,  not  only  of  estranging  her- 
self from  us,  but  of  mortgaging  herself  and  her  resources  to 


82  THE   OBISI8. 

our  enemies,  the  whole  contest  is  changed :  and  the  question 
is  how  far  Great  Britain  may,  by  every  means  in  her  power, 
destroy,  or  render  useless,  a  connexion  contrived  for  her  ruin, 
and  the  aggrandizement  of  France.  Under  such  circum- 
stances, the  Taws  of  self-preservation  must  direct  the  conduct 
of  Britain,  and  if  the  British  colonies  are  to  become  an 
accession  to  France,  will  direct  her  to  render  that  accession 
of  as  little  avail  as  possible  to  her  enemy." 

I  consider  you  in  this  declaration,  like  madmen  biting  in 
the  hour  of  death.  It  contains  likewise  a  fraudulent  mean- 
ness; for,  in  order  to  justify  a  barbarous  conclusion,  you 
have  advanced  a  false  position.  The  treaty  we  have  formed 
with  France  is  open,  noble,  and  generous.  It  is  true  policy, 
founded  on  sound  philosophy,  and  neither  a  surrender  or 
mortgage,  as  you  would  scandalously  insinuate.  I  have 
seen  every  article,  and  speak  from  positive  knowledge.  In 
France,  we  have  found  an  affectionate  friend  and  faithful 
ally ;  in  Britain,  we  have  found  nothing  but  tyranny,  cruelty, 
and  infidelity. 

But  the  happiness  is,  that  the  mischief  you  threaten,  is 
not  in  your  power  to  execute ;  and  if  it  were,  the  punish- 
ment would  return  upon  you  in  a  ten-fold  degree.  The 
humanity  of  America  hath  hitherto  restrained  her  from  acts 
of  retaliation,  and  the  affection  she  retains  for  many  indi- 
viduals in  England,  who  have  fed,  clothed  and  comforted 
her  prisoners,  has,  to  the  present  day,  warded  off  her  resent- 
ment, and  operated  as  a  screen  to  the  whole.  But  even 
these  considerations  must  cease,  when  national  objects  inter- 
fere and  oppose  them.  Repeated  aggravations  will  provoke 
a  retort,  and  policy  justify  the  measure.  We  mean  now  to 
take  you  seriously  up  upon  your  own  ground  and  principle, 
and  as  you  do,  so  shall  you  be  done  by. 

You  ought  to  know,  gentlemen,  that  England  and  Scot- 
land are  far  more  exposed  to  incendiary  desolation  than 
America,  in  her  present  state,  can  possibly  be.  "We  occupy 
a  country,  with  but  few  towns,  and  whose  riches  consist  in 
land  and  annual  produce.  The  two  last  can  suffer  but  little, 
and  that  only  within  a  very  limited  compass.  In  Britain  it 
is  otherwise.  Her  wealth  lies  chiefly  in '  cities  and  large 
towns,  the  depositories  of  manufactories  and  fleets  of  mer- 
chantmen.— There  is  not  a  nobleman's  country  seat  but  may 
be  laid  in  ashes  by  a  single  person.  Your  own  may  proba- ., 
bly  contribute  to  the  proof :  in  short,  there  is  no  evil  which  w 
cannot  be  returned  wnen  you  come  to  incendiary  mischief. 


THE   CRISIS.  83 

1  he  ships  in  the  Thames,  may  certainly  be  as  easily  set  on 
fir«,  as  the  temporary  bridge  was  a  few  years  ago ;  yet  ol 
thai;  affair  no  discovery  was  ever  made ;  and  the  loss  you 
would  sustain  by  sucn  an  event,  executed  at  a  proper  sea 
son,  is  infinitely  greater  than  any  you  can  inflict.  The  East- 
India  house,  and  the  bank,  neither  are,  nor  can  be  secure 
from  this  sort  of  destruction,  and,  as  Dr.  Price  justly  ob- 
serves, a  fire  at  the  latter,  would  bankrupt  the  nation.  It 
has  never  been  the  custom  of  France  and  England,  when  at 
war,  to  make  those  havocs  on  each  other,  because  the  ease 
with  which  they  could  retaliate,  rendered  it  as  impolitic  as 
if  each  had  destroyed  his  own. 

But  think  not,  gentlemen,  that  our  distance  secures  you, 
or  our  invention  fails  us.  We  can  much  easier  accomplish 
such  a  point  than  any  nation  in  Europe.  We  talk  the  same 
language,  dress  in  the  same  habit,  and  appear  with  the  same 
manners  as  yourselves.  We  can  pass  rrom  one  part  of 
England  to  another  unsuspected ;  many  of  us  are  as  well 
acquainted  with  the  country  as  you  are,  and  should  you  im- 
politically  provoke  us,  you  will  most  assuredly  lament  the 
effects  of  it.  Mischiefs  of  this  kind  require  no  army  to  exe- 
cute them.  The  means  are  obvious,  and  the  opportunities 
nnguardable.  I  hold  up  a  warning  to  your  senses,  if  you 
have  any  left,  and  "  to  tne  unhappy  people  likewise,  whose 
affairs  are  committed  to  you."*  I  call  not  with  the  rancour 
of  an  enemy,  but  the  earnestness  of  a  friend,  on  the  deluded 
people  of  England,  lest,  between  your  blunders  and  theirs, 
they  sink  beneath  the  evils  contrived  for  us. 

"  He  who  lives  in  a  glass  house,"  says  a  Spanish  proverb, 
*'  should  never  begin  throwing  stones.  This,  gentlemen,  is 
exactly  vour  case,  and  you  must  be  the  most  ignorant  of 
mankind,  or  suppose  us  so,  not  to  see  on  whicn  side  the 
balance  of  accounts  will  fall.  There  are  many  other  modes 
of  retaliation,  which,  for  several  reasons,  I  choose  not  to 
mention.  But  be  assured  of  this,  that  the  instant  you  put 
your  threat  into  execution,  a  counter-blow  will  follow  it.  If 
you  openly  profess  yourselves  savages,  it  is  high  time  we 
ihould  treat  you  as  such,  and  if  nothing  but  distress  can 
recover  you  to  reason,  to  punish  will  become  an  office  of 
Charity. 

While  your  fleet  lay  last  winter  in  the  Delaware,  I  offered 

*  my  service  to  the  Pennsylvania  navy-board  then  at  Trenton, 

*  as  ono  who  would  make  a  party  with  them,  or  any  four  or 

*  General  Clinton's  letter  to  Congress. 


84  THE   CBISIS. 

five  gentlemen,  on  an  expedition  down  the  river  to  set  fire 
to  it,  and  though  it  was  not  then  accepted,  nor  the  thing 
personally  attempted,  it  is  more  than  probable  that  your  own 
folly  will  provoke  a  much  more  ruinous  act.  Say  not  when 
mischief  is  done,  that  you  had  not  warning,  and  remember 
that  we  do  not  begin  it,  but  mean  to  repay  it.  Thus  much 
for  your  savage  and  impolitic  threat. 

In  another  part  of  your  proclamation  you  say,  "  But  if 
the  honors  of  a  military  life  are  become  the  object  of  the 
Americans,  let  them  seek  those  honors  under  the  banners  of 
their  rightful  sovereign,  and  in  fighting  the  battles  of  the 
united  British  empire,  against  our  late  mutual  and  natural 
enemies."  Surely !  the  union  of  absurdity  with  madness 
was  never  marked  in  more  distinguishable  lines  than  these. 
Your  rightful  sovereign,  as  you  call  him,  may  do  well 
enough  for  you,  who  dare  not  inquire  into  the  humble  capa-  - 
cities  of  the  man  ;  but  we,  who  estimate  persons  and  things 
by  their  real  worth,  cannot  suffer  our  judgments  to  be  so 
imposed  upon ;  and  unless  it  is  your  wish  to  see  him  ex- 
posed, it  ought  to  be  your  endeavour  to  keep  him  out  of 
sight.  The  less  you  have  to  say  about  him  tne  better.  We 
have  done  with  him,  and  that  ought  to  be  answer  enough. 
You  have  been  often  told  so.  Strange !  that  the  answer 
must  be  so  often  repeated.  You  go  a  begging  with  your 
king  as  with  a  brat,  or  with  some  unsaleable  commodity 
you  are  tired  of ;  and  though  every  body  tells  you  no,  no, 
still  you  keep  hawking  him  about.  But  there  is  one  that 
will  have  him  in  a  little  time,  and  as  we  have  no  inclina- 
tion to  disappoint  you  of  a  customer,  we  bid  nothing  for  him. 
•  The  impertinent  folly  of  the  paragraph  that  I  have  just 
quoted,  deserves  no  other  notice  than  to  be  laughed  at  and 
thrown  by,  but  the  principle  on  which  it  is  founded  is  de- 
testable. We  are  invited  to  submit  to  a  man  who  has 
attempted  by  every  cruelty  to  destroy  us,  and  to  join  him  in 
making  war  against  France,  who  is  already  at  war  against 
him  for  our  support. 

Can  Bedlam,  in  concert  with  Lucifer,  form  a  more  mad 
and  devilish  request  ?  Were  it  possible  a  people  could  sink 
into  such  apostacy  they  would  deserve  to  be  swept  from  the 
earth  like  the  inhabitants  of  Sodom  and  Gomorrah.  The 
proposition  is  an  universal  affront  to  the  rank  which  man 
holds  in  the  creation,  and  an  indignity  to  him  who  placed 
him  there.  It  supposes  him  made  up  without  a  spark  of 
honor,  and  under  no  obligation  to  God  or  man. 


THE   CRISIS. 


What  sort  of  men  or  Christians  must  you  suppose  the 
A-inericans  to  be,  who,  after  seeing  their  most  humble 
petitions  insultingly  rejected  ;  the  most  grievous  laws  passed 
to  distress  them  in  every  quarter  ;  and  undeclared  war  let 
loose  upon  them,  and  Indians  and  negroes  invited  to  the 
slaughter  ;  who,  after  seeing  their  kinsmen  murdered,  their 
fellow  citizens  starved  to  death  in  prisons,  and  their  houses. 
and  property  destroyed  and  burned  ;  who,  after  the  most 
serious  appeals  to  heaven  ;  the  most  solemn  abjuration  by 
oath  of  all  government  connected  with  you,  and  the  most 
heart-felt  pledges  and  protestations  of  faith  to  each  other  • 
and  who,  after  soliciting  the  friendship,  and  entering  into 
alliances  with  other  nations,  should  at  last  break  through  al1. 
these  obligations,  civil  and  divine,  by  complying  with  your 
horrid  ana  infernal  proposal  ?  Ought  we  ever  after  to  be 
considered  as  a  part  of  the  human  race  ?  Or  ought  we  not 
rather  to  be  blotted  from  the  society  of  mankind,  and  be- 
come a  spectacle  of  misery  to  the  world  ?  But  there  is  some- 
thing in  corruption,  which,  like  a  jaundiced  eye,  transfere 
the  colour  of  itself  to  the  object  it  looks  upon,  and  see? 
every  thing  stained  and  impure  ;  for  unless  you  were 
capable  of  such  conduct  yourselves,  you  would  never  have 
supposed  such  a  character  hi  us.  The  offer  fixes  your  in- 
famy. It  exhibits  you  as  a  nation  without  faith;  with 
whom  oaths  and  treaties  are  considered  as  trifles,  and  the 
breaking  of  them  as  the  breaking  of  a  bubble.  Regard  to 
decency,  or  to  rank,  might  have  taught  you  better  ;  or  pride 
inspired  you,  though  virtue  could  not.  There  is  not  left  a 
step  in  the  degradation  of  character  to  which  you  can  now 
descend  ;  you  aave  put  your  foot  on  the  ground  floor,  and 
the  key  01  the  dungeon  is  turned  upon  you. 

That  the  invitation  may  want  nothing  of  being  a  com- 
plete monster,  you  have  thought  proper  to  finish  it  with  an 
assertion  which  has  no  foundation,  either  in  fact  or  philo- 
sophy ;  and  as  Mr.  Ferguson,  your  secretary,  is  a  man  of 
letters,  and  has  made  civil  society  his  study,  and  published 
a  treatise  on  that  subject,  I  address  this  part  to  him. 

In  the  close  of  the  paragraph  which  I  last  quoted,  France 
is  styled  the  "  natural  enemy  "  of  England,  and  by  way  of 
lugging  us  into  some  strange  idea,  sne  is  styled  "  the  late 
mutual  and  natural  enemy"  of  both  countries.  I  deny  that 
she  ever  was  a  natural  enemy  of  either;  and  that  there 
does  not  exist  in  nature  such  a  principle.  The  expression  is 
an  unmeaning  barbarism,  and  wholly  unphilosophicnl.  when 


36 

applied  to  beings  of  the  same  species,  let  their  station  in  the 
creation  be  what  it  may.  We  have  a  perfect  idea  of  a 
natural  enemy  when  we  think  of  the  devil,  because  the 
enmity  is  perpetual,  unalterable,  and  unabateable.  It  ad- 
mits neither  of  peace,  truce,  or  treaty ;  consequently  the 
warfare  is  eternal,  and  therefore  it  is  natural.  But  man 
with  man  cannot  arrange  in  the  same  opposition.  Their 
quarrels  are  accidental  and  equivocally  created.  They  be- 
come friends  or  enemies  as  the  change  of  temper,  or  the  cast 
of  interest  inclines  them.  The  Creator  of  man  did  not  con- 
stitute them  the  natural  enemy  of  each  other.  He  has  not 
made  any  one  order  of  beings  so.  Even  wolves  may  quarrel, 
still  they  herd  together.  If  any  two  nations  are  so,  then 
must  all  nations  be  so,  otherwise  it  is  not  nature  but  custom, 
and  the  offence  frequently  originates  with  the  accuser.  Eng- 
land is  as  truly  the  natural  enemy  of  France,  as  France  is 
of  England,  and  perhaps  more  so.  Separated  from  the  rest 
of  Europe,  she  has  contracted  an  unsocial  habit  of  manners, 
and  imagines  in  others  the  jealousy  she  creates  in  herself. 
Never  long  satisfied  with  peace,  she  supposes  the  discontent 
universal,  and  buoyed  up  with  her  own  importance,  con- 
ceives herself  to  be  the  object  pointed  at.  The  expression 
has  been  often  used,  and  always  with  a  fraudulent  design  ; 
for  when  the  idea  of  a  natural  enemy  is  conceived,  it  pre- 
vents all  other  inquiries,  and  the  real  cause  of  the  quarrel  is 
hidden  in  the  universality  of  the  conceit.  Men  start  at  the 
notion  of  a  natural  enemy,  and  ask  no  other  question.  The 
cry  obtains  credit  like  the  alarm  of  a  mad  dog,  and  is  one 
of  those  kind  of  tricks,  which,  by  operating  on  the  common 
passions,  secures  their  interest  through  their  folly. 

But  we,  sir,  are  not  to  be  thus  imposed  upon.  "We  live  in 
a  large  world,  and  have  extended  our  ideas  beyond  the  limits 
and  prejudices  of  an  island.  We  hold  out  the  right  hand 
of  friendship  to  all  the  universe,  and  we  conceive  that  there 
is  a  sociality  in  the  manners  of  France,  which  is  much  better 
disposed  to  peace  and  negociation  than  that  of  England,  and 
until  the  latter  becomes  more  civilized,  she  cannot  expect  to 
live  long  at  peace  with  any  power.  Her  common  language 
is  vulgar  and  offensive,  and  children  with  their  milk  suck 
in  the  rudiments  of  insult — "  The  arm  of  Britain !  The 
mighty  arm  of  Britain  !  Britain  that  shakes  the  earth  to  its 
centre  and  its  poles  !  The  scourge  of  France  1  The  terror 
of  the  world  !  That  governs  with  a  nod,  and  pours  down 
vengeance  like  a  God."  This  language  neither  makes  a 


THE   CRISIS.  87 

nation  great  or  little ;  but  it  shows  a  savageness  of  manners, 
and  has  a  tendency  to  keep  national  animosity  alive.  The 
entertainments  of  the  stage  are  calculated  to  the  same  end, 
and  almost  every  public  exhibition  is  tinctured  with  insult. 
Yet  England  is  always  in  dread  of  France.  Terrified  at  the 
apprehension  of  an  invasion.  Suspicious  of  being  outwitted 
in  a  treaty,  and  privately  cringing  though  she  is  publicly 
offending.  Let  her,  therefore,  reform  her  manners  and  do 
justice,  and  she  will  find  the  idea  of  a  natural  enemy,  to  be 
only  a  phantom  of  her  own  imagination. 

Little  did  I  think,  at  this  period  of  the  war,  to  see  a  pro- 
clamation which  could  promise  you  no  one  useful  purpose 
whatever,  and  tend  only  to  expose  you.  One  would  tnink 
that  you  were  just  awakened  from  a  four  years'  dream,  and 
knew  nothing  of  what  had  passed  in  the  interval.  Is  this  a 
time  to  be  offering  pardons,  or  renewing  the  long  forgotten 
subjects  of  charters  and  taxation  ?  Is  it  worth  your  while, 
after  every  force  has  failed  you,  to  retreat  under  the  shelter 
of  argument  and  persuasion  ?  Or  can  you  think  that  we, 
with  nearly  half  your  army  prisoners,  and  in  alliance  with 
France,  are  to  be  begged  or  threatened  into  submission  by 
a  piece  of  paper  ?  But  as  commissioners  at  a  hundred  pounds 
sterling  a  week  each,  you  conceive  yourselves  bound  to 
do  something,  and  the  genius  of  ill  fortune  told  you,  that 
you  must  write. 

For  my  own  part,  I  have  not  put  pen  to  paper  these 
several  months.  Convinced  of  our  superiority  by  the  issue 
of  every  campaign,  I  was  inclined  to  hope,  that  that  which 
all  the  rest  of  the  world  now  see,  would  become  visible  to 
you,  and  therefore  felt  unwilling  to  ruffle  your  temper  by 
fretting  you  with  repetitions  and  discoveries.  There  have 
been  intervals  of  hesitation  in  your  conduct,  from  which  it 
seemed  a  pity  to  disturb  you,  and  a  charity  to  leave  you  to 
yourselves.  You  have  often  stopped,  as  if  you  intended  to 
think,  but  your  thoughts  have  ever  been  too  early  or  too 
late. 

There  was  a  time  when  Britain  disdained  to  answer,  >r 
even  hear  a  petition  from  America.  That  time  is  past,  and 
she  in  her  turn  is  petitioning  our  acceptance.  We  now  stand 
on  higher  ground,  and  offer  her  peace ;  and  the  time  will 
come  when  she  perhaps  in  vain,  will  ask  it  from  us.  The 
latter  case  is  as  probable  as  the  former  ever  was.  She  can- 
not refuse  to  acknowledge  our  independence  with  greater 
obstinacy  than  she  before  refused  to  repeal  her  laws ;  and  if 


88  THE  CRISIS 

America  alone  could  bring  her  to  the  one,  united  with 
France  she  will  reduce  her  to  the  other.  There  is  something 
in  obstinacy  which  differs  from  every  other  passion ;  when- 
ever it  fails  it  never  recovers,  but  either  breaks  like  iron,  or 
crumbles  sulkily  away  like  a  fractured  arch.  Most  other 
passions  have  their  periods  of  fatigue  and  rest ;  their  suffer- 
ings and  their  cure  ;  but  obstinacy  has  no  resource,  and  the 
first  wound  is  mortal.  You  have  already  begun  to  give  it 
up,  and  you  will,  from  the  natural  construction  of  the  vice, 
find  yourselves  both  obliged  and  inclined  to  do  so. 

If  you  look  back  you  see  nothing  but  loss  and  disgrace. 
If  you  look  forward  the  same  scene  continues,  and  the  close 
is  an  impenetrable  gloom.  You  may  plan  and  execute  little 
mischiefs,-  but  are  they  worth  the  expense  they  cost  you,  or 
will  such  partial  evils  have  any  effect  on  the  general  cause  ? 
Your  expedition  to  Egg-Harbour,  will  be  felt  at  a  distance 
like  an  attack  upon  a  hen-roost,  and  expose  you  in  Europe, 
with  a  sort  of  childish  phrenzy.  Is  it  worth  while  to  keep 
an  army  to  protect  you  in  writing  proclamations,  or  to  get 
once  a  year  into  winter-quarters  ?  Possessing  yourselves  of 
towns  is  not  conquest,  but  convenience,  and  in  which  you 
will  one  day  or  other  be  trepanned.  Your  retreat  from 
Philadelphia,  was  only  a  timely  escape,  and  your  next 
expedition  may  be  less  fortunate. 

It  would  puzzle  all  the  politicians  in  the  universe  to  con- 
ceive what  you  stay  for,  or  why  you  should  have  staid  so 
long.  You  are  prosecuting  a  war  in  which  you  confess  you 
have  neither  object  nor  hope,  and  that  conquest,  could  it  be 
effected,  would  not  repay  the  charges :  in  the  mean  while 
the  rest  of  your  affairs  are  running  to  ruin,  and  a  European 
war  kindling  against  you.  In  such  a  situation,  there  is 
neither  doubt  nor  difficulty ;  the  first  rudiments  of  reason 
will  determine  the  choice,  for  if  peace  can  be  procured  with 
more  advantages  than  even  a  conquest  can  be  obtained,  he 
must  be  an  idiot  indeed  that  hesitates. 

But  you  are  probably  buoyed  up  by  a  set  of  wretched 
mortals,  who,  having  deceived  themselves,  are  cringing,  with 
the  duplicity  of  a  spaniel,  for  a  little  temporary  bread. 
Those  men  will  tell  you  just  what  you  please.  It  is  their 
interest  to  amuse,  in  order  to  lengthen  out  their  protection. 
They  study  to  keep  you  amongst  them  for  that  very  purpose : 
and  in  proportion  as  you  disregard  their  advice,  and  grow 
callous  to  their  complaints,  they  will  stretch  into  improba- 
bility, and  season  their  flattery  the  higher.  Characters  like 


THE   CRISIS.  89 


these,  are  to  be  found  in  every  country,  and  every  country 
•will  despise  them. 

COMMON  SENSE. 

Philadelphia,   Oct.  20,  1778. 


NUMBER  VIL 
TO  THE  PEOPLE  OF  ENGLAND. 

THERE  are  stages  in  the  business  of  serious  life  in  which  to 
amuse  is  cruel,  but  to  deceive  is  to  destroy ;  and  it  is  of  little 
consequence,  in  the  conclusion,  whether  men  deceive  them- 
selves, or  submit,  by  a  kind  of  mutual  consent,  to  the 
impositions  of  each  other.  That  England  has  long  been 
under  the  influence  of  delusion  or  mistake,  needs  no  other 
proof  than  the  unexpected  and  wretched  situation  that  she 
is  now  involved  in :  and  so  powerful  has  been  the  influence, 
that  no  provision  was  ever  made  or  thought  of  against  the 
misfortune,  because  the  possibility  of  its  happening  was 
never  conceived. 

The  general  and  successful  resistance  of  America,  the 
conquest  of  Burgoyne,  and  a  war  in  France,  were  treated  in 
parliament  as  the  dreams  of  a  discontented  opposition,  or  a 
distempered  imagination.  They  were  beheld  as  objects 
unworthy  of  a  serious  thought,  and  the  bare  intimation  of 
them  afforded  the  ministry  a  triumph  of  laughter.  Short 
triumph  indeed !  For  every  thing  wnich  has  been  predicted 
has  happened,  and  all  that  was  promised  has  failed.  A 
long  series  of  politics  so  remarkably  distinguished  by  a  suc- 
cession of  misfortunes,  without  one  alleviating  turn,  must 
certainly  have  something  in  it  systematically  wrong.  It  is 
sufficient  to  awaken  the  most  credulous  into  suspicion,  and 
the  most  obstinate  into  thought.  Either  the  means  in  your 
power  are  insufficient,  or  the  measures  ill  planned ;  either 
the  execution  has  been  bad,  or  the  thing  attempted  impracti- 
cable ;  or,  to  speak  more  emphatically,  either  you  are  not 
able  or  heaven  is  not  willing.  For,  why  is  it  that  you  have 
not  conquered  ns  ?  Who,  or  what  has  prevented  you  ?  You 
have  had  every  opportunity  that  you  could  desire,  and  suc- 
ceeded to  your  utmost  wish  in  every  preparatory  means. 


90  THE   CKIBIS. 

Your  fleets  and  armies  have  arrived  in  America  without  au 
accident.  No  uncommon  misfortune  hath  intervened.  No 
foreign  nation  hath  interfered  until  the  time  which  you  had 
allotted  for  victory  was  past.  The  opposition,  either  in  or 
out  of  parliament,  neither  disconcerted  your  measures, 
retarded  or  diminished  your  force.  They  only  foretold  your 
fate.  Every  ministerial  scheme  was  carried  with  as  high  a 
hand  as  if  tne  whole  nation  had  been  unanimous.  Every 
thing  wanted  was  asked  for,  and  every  thing  asked  for  was 
granted. 

A  greater  force  was  not  within  the  compass  of  your  abili- 
ties to  send,  and  the  time  you  sent  it  was  of  all  others  the 
most  favorable.  You  were  then  at  rest  with  the  whole 
world  beside.  You  had  the  range  of  every  court  in  Europe 
uncontradicted  by  us.  You  amused  us  with  a  tale  of  the 
commissioners  of  peace,  and  under  that  disguise  collected  a 
numerous  army  and  came  almost  unexpectedly  upon  us. 
The  force  was  much  greater  than  we  looked  for  ;  and  that 
which  we  had  to  oppose  it  with,  was  unequal  in  numbers, 
badly  armed,  and  poorly  disciplined ;  beside  which,  it  was 
embodied  only  for  a  short  time,  and  expired  within  a  few 
months  after  your  arrival.  We  had  governments  to  form ; 
measures  to  concert  •  an  army  to  train,  and  every  necessary 
article  to  import  or  to  create.  Our  non-importation  scheme 
had  exhausted  our  stores,  and  your  command  by  sea  inter- 
cepted our  supplies.  "We  were  a  people  unknown,  and  un- 
connected with  the  political  world,  and  strangers  to  the 
disposition  of  foreign  powers.  Could  you  possibly  wish  for 
a  more  favourable  conjunction  of  circumstances  ?  Yet  all 
these  have  happened  and  passed 'away,  and,  as  it  were,  left 
you  with  a  laugh.  They  are  likewise  events  of  such  an 
original  nativity  as  can  never  happen  again,  unless  a  new 
world  should  arise  from  the  ocean. 

If  any  thing  can  be  a  lesson  to  presumption,  surely  the 
circumstances  of  this  war  will  have  their  effect.  Had 
Britain  been  defeated  by  any  European  power,  her  pride 
would  have  drawn  consolation  from  the  importance  01  her 
conquerors ;  but  in  the  present  case,  she  is  excelled  by  those 
that  she  affected  to  despise,  and  her  own  opinions  retorting 
upon  herself,  become  an  aggravation  of  her  disgrace.  Mis- 
fortune and  experience  are  lost  upon  mankind,  when  they 
produce  neither  reflection  nor  reformation.  Evilu,  like 
poisons,  have  their  uses,  and  there  are  diseases  which  no 
other  remedy  can  reach.  It  hat*  been  the  crime  and  folly 


THE   CRISIS.  91 

Df  England  to  suppose  herself  invincible,  and  that,  without 
acknowledging  or  perceiving  that  a  full  third  of  her  strength 
was  drawn  from  the  country  she  is  now  at  war  with.  The 
arm  of  Britain  has  been  spoken  of  as  the  arm  of  the 
Almighty,  and  she  has  lived  of  late  as  if  she  thought  the 
whole  world  created  for  her  diversion.  Her  politics,  instead 
of  civilizing,  has  tended  to  brutalize  mankind,  and  under  the 
vain,  unmeaning  title  of  "  Defender  of  the  Faith,"  she  ha& 
made  war  like  an  Indian  against  the  religion  of  humanity. 
Her  cruelties  in  the  East  Indies  will  never  be  forgotten , 
and  it  is  somewhat  remarkable  that  the  produce  of  that 
ruined  country,  transported  to  America,  should  there  kindle 
up  a  war  to  punish  the  destroyer.  The  chain  is  continued, 
though  with  a  mysterious  kind  of  uniformity  both  in  the 
crime  and  the  punishment.  The  latter  runs  parallel  with 
the  former,  and  time  and  fate  will  give  it  a  perfect  illustra- 
tion. 

"WTien  information  is  withheld,  ignorance  becomes  a 
reasonable  excuse ;  and  one  would  charitably  hope  that  the 
people  of  England  do  not  encourage  cruelty  from  choice  but 
from  mistake.  Their  recluse  situation,  surrounded  by  the 
sea,  preserves  them  from  the  calamities  of  war,  and  keeps 
them  in  the  dark  as  to  the  conduct  of  their  own  armies. 
They  see  not,  therefore  they  feel  not.  They  tell  the  tale 
that  is  told  them  and  believe  it,  and  accustomed  to  no  other 
news  than  their  own,  they  receive  i;t,  stripped  of  its  horrors 
and  prepared  for  the  palate  of  the  nation,  through  the  chan- 
nel of  the  London  Gazette.  They  are  made  to  believe  that 
their  generals  and  armies  differ  nom  those  of  other  nations, 
and  have  nothing  of  rudeness  or  barbarity  in  them.  They 
suppose  them  what  they  wish  them  to  be.  They  feel  a  dis- 
grace in  thinking  otherwise,  and  naturally  encourage  the 
belief  from  a  partiality  to  themselves.  There  was  a  time 
when  I  felt  the  same  prejudices,  and  reasoned  from  the  same 
errors;  but  experience,  sad  and  painful  experience,  hag 
taught  me  better.  What  the  conduct  of  former  armies  was. 
I  know  not,  but  what  the  conduct  of  the  present  is,  I  well 
know.  It  is  low,  cruel,  indolent  and  profligate ;  and  had 
the  people  of  America  no  other  cause  for  separation  than 
what  the  army  has  occasioned,  that  alone  is  cause  sufficient. 

The  field  of  politics  in  England  is  far  more  extensive  than 
that  of  news.     Men  have  a  right  to  reason  for  themselves, 
and  though  they  cannot  contradict  the  intelligence  in  tha 
Gazette,  they  may  frame  upon  it  wl>°t  .sentiments 


92  THE   CRISIS. 

they  please.  But  the  misfortune  is,  that  a  general  ignorance 
lias  prevailed  over  the  whole  nation  respecting  America, 
The  ministry  and  minority  have  both  been  wrong.  The 
former  was  always  so,  the  latter  only  lately  so.  Politics,  to 
l)e  executively  right,  must  have  a  unity  of  means  and  time, 
and  a  defect  in  either  overthrows  the  whole.  The  ministry 
rejected  the  plans  of  the  minority  while  they  were  practi- 
cable, and  joined  in  them  when  they  became  impracticable. 
From  wrong  measures  they  got  into  wrong  time,  and  have 
now  completed  the  circle  of  absurdity  by  closing  it  upon 
themselves. 

I  happened  to  come  to  America  a  few  months  before  the 
breaking  out  of  hostilities.  I  found  the  disposition  of  the 
people  such,  that  they  might  have  been  led  by  a  thread  and 
governed  by  a  reed.  Their  suspicion  was  quick  and  pene- 
trating, but  their  attachment  to  Britain  was  obstinate,  and 
it  was  at  that  time  a  kind  of  treason  to  speak  against  it. 
They  disliked  the  ministry,  but  they  esteemed  the  nation. 
Their  idea  of  grievance  operated  without  resentment,  and 
their  single  object  was  reconciliation.  Bad  as  I  believed  the 
ministry  to  be,  I  never  conceived  them  capable  of  a  measure 
so  rash  and  wicked  as  the  commencing  of  hostilities ;  much 
less  did  I  imagine  the  nation  would  encourage  it.  I  viewed 
the  dispute  as  a  kind  of  law-suit,  in  which  I  supposed  the 
parties  would  find  a  way  either  to  decide  or  settle  it.  I  had 
no  thoughts  of  independence  or  of  arms.  The  world  could 
not  then  have  persuaded  me  that  I  should  be  either  a  soldier 
or  an  author.  If  I  had  any  talents  for  either,  they  were 
buried  in  me,  and  might  ever  have  continued  so,  had  not  the 
necessity  of  the  times  dragged  and  driven  them  into  action. 
I  had  formed  my  plan  of  life,  and  conceiving  myself  happy, 
wished  every  body  else  so.  But  when  the  country,  into 
which  I  had  just  set  my  foot,  was  set  on  fire  about  my  ears, 
it  was  time  to  stir.  It  was  time  for  every  man  to  stir.  Those 
who  had  been  long  settled  had  something  to  defend  ;  those 
who  had  just  come  had  something  to  pursue;  and  the  call 
and  the  concern  was  equal  and  universal.  For  in  a  country 
where  all'  men  were  once  adventurers,  the  difference  of  a  few 
years  in  their  arrival  could  make  none  in  their  right. 

The  breaking  out  of  hostilities  opened  a  new  suspicion  in 
the  politics  of  America,  which,  though  at  that  time  very 
rare,  has  since  been  proved  to  be  verv  right.  "What  I  allude 
to  is,  "  a  secret  and  fixed  determination  in  the  British  cabi- 
net to  annex  America  to  the  crown  of  England  as  a  con- 


THE   OKI8I8.  93 

quered  country."  If  this  be  taken  as  the  object,  then  the 
whole  line  of  conduct  pursued  by  the  ministry,  though  rash 
in  its  origin  and  ruinous  in  its  consequences,  is  nevertheless 
uniform  and  consistent  in  its  parts.  It  applies  to  every  case, 
and  resolves  every  difficulty.  But  if  taxation,  or  any  thing 
else,  be  taken  in  its  room,  there  is  no  proportion  between 
the  object  and  the  charge.  Nothing  but  the  whole  soil  and 
property  of  the  country  can  be  placed  as  a  possible  equiva- 
lent against  the  millions  which  the  ministry  expended.  No 
taxes  raised  in  America  could  possibly  repay  it.  A  revenue 
of  two  millions  sterling  a  year  would  not  discharge  the  sum 
and  interest  accumulated  thereon,  in  twenty  years. 

Reconciliation  never  appears  to  have  been  the  wish  or  the 
object  of  the  administration,  they  looked  on  conquest  as 
certain  and  infallible,  and,  under  that  persuasion,  sought  to 
drive  the  Americans  into  what  they  might  style  a  general 
rebellion,  and  then,  crushing  them  with  arms  in  theirnands, 
reap  the  rich  harvest  of  a  general  confiscation,  and  silence 
them  for  ever.  The  dependants  at  court  were  too  numerous 
to  be  provided  for  in  England.  The  market  for  plunder  in 
the  East-Indies  was  over ;  and  the  profligacy  of  government 
required  that  a  new  mine  should  be  opened,  and  that  mine 
co  aid  be  no  other  than  America,  conquered  and  forfeited. 
They  had  no  where  else  to  go.  Every  other  channel  was 
drained ;  and  extravagance,  with  the  thirst  of  a  drunkard, 
was  gaping  for  supplies. 

If  the  ministry  deny  this  to  have  been  their  plan,  it 
becomes  them  to  explain  what  was  their  plan.  For  either 
they  have  abused  us  in  coveting  property  they  never  labored 
for,  or  they  have  abused  you  in  expending  an  amazing  sum 
upon  an  incompetent  object.  Taxation,  as  I  mentioned 
before,  could  never  be  worth  the  charge  of  obtaining  it  by 
arms;  and  any  kind  of  formal  obedience  which  America 
could  have  made,  would  have  weighed  with  the  lightness  of 
a  laugh  against  such  a  load  of  expense.  It  is  therefore 
most  probable,  that  the  ministry  will  at  last  justify  their 
policy  by  their  dishonesty,  and  openly  declare  that  their 
original  design  was  conquest;  and  in  this  case,  it  well 
becomes  the  people  of  England  to  consider  how  far  the 
nation  would  nave  been  benefited  by  the  success. 

In  a  general  view,  there  are  few  conquests  which  repay 
the  charge  of  making  them,  and  mankind  are  pretty  wci' 
convinced  that  it  can  never  be  worth  their  while  to  g •  >  t  > 
war  for  profit's  sake.  If  they  are  made  war  upon,  their 


94  THE   CRISIS. 

country  invaded,  or  their  existence  at  stake,  it  is  their  dutj 
to  defend  and  preserve  themselves,  but  in  every  other 
light,  and  from  every  other  cause,  is  war  inglorious  and  de- 
testable. But  to  return  to  the  case  in  question — 

"When  conquests  are  made  of  foreign  countries,  it  is  sup- 
posed that  the  commerce  and  dominion  of  the  country  which 
made  them  are  extended.  But  this  could  neither  be  the 
object  nor  the  consequence  of  the  present  war.  You  enjoyed 
the  whole  commerce  before.  It  could  receive  no  possible 
addition  by  a  conquest,  but  on  the  contrary,  must  diminish 
as  the  inhabitants  were  reduced  in  numbers  and  wealth. 
You  had  the  same  dominion  over  the  country  which  you 
used  to  have,  and  had  no  complaint  to  make  against  her 
for  breach  of  any  part  of  the  contract  between  you  or  her, 
or  contending  against  any  established  custom,  commercial, 
political  or  territorial.  The  country  and  commerce  were 
both  your  own  when  you  began  to  conquer,  in  the  same 
manner  and  form  as  they  had  been  your  own  an  hundred 
years  before.  Nations  have  sometimes  been  induced  to 
make  conquests  for  the  sake  of  reducing  the  power  of  their 
enemies,  or  bringing  it  to  a  balance  with  their  own.  But  thia 
could  be  no  part  of  your  plan.  No  foreign  authority  was 
claimed  here,  neither  was  any  such  authority  suspected  by 
you,  or  acknowledged  or  imagined  by  us.  What  then,  in 
the  name  of  heaven,  could  you  go  to  war  for  ?  Or  what 
chance  could  you  possibly  have  in  the  event,  but  either  to 
!.  jLd  the  same  country  which  you  held  before,  and  that  in  a 
much  worse  condition,  or  to  lose,  with  an  amazing  expense, 
what  you  might  have  retained  without  a  farthing  of 
charges. 

War  never  can  be  the  interest  of  a  trading  nation,  any 
more  than  quarrelling  can  be  profitable  to  a  man  in 
business.  But  to  make  war  with  those  who  trade  with  us, 
is  like  setting  a  bull-dog  upon  a  customer  at  the  shop-door. 
The  least  degree  of  common  sense  shows  the  madness  of  the 
latter,  and  it  will  apply  with  the  same  force  of  conviction 
to  the  former.  Piratical  nations,  having  neither  commerce 
or  commodities  of  their  own  to  lose,  may  make  war  upon 
all  the  world,  and  lucratively  find  their  account  in  it ;  out 
it  is  quite  otherwise  with  Britain :  for,  besides  the  stoppage 
of  trade  in  time  of  war,  she  exposes  more  of  her  own  pro- 
perty to  be  lost,  than  she  has  the  chance  of  taking  from 
others.  Some  ministerial  gentlemen  in  parliament  have 
mentioned  the  greatness  of  her  trade  as  an  apology  for  the 


THE    CRISIS.  95 

greatness  of  her  loss.  This  is  miserable  politics  indeed  1 
Because  it  ought  to  have  been  given  as  a  reason  for  her  not 
engaging  in  a  war  at  first.  The  coast  of  America  com- 
mands the  West-India  trade  almost  as  effectually  as  the 
coast  of  Africa  does  that  of  the  Straits ;  and  England  can 
no  more  carry  on  the  former  without  the  consent  of  Ame- 
rica, than  she  can  the  latter  without  a  Mediterranean  pass. 

In  whatever  light  the  war  with  America  is  considered 
upon  commercial  principles,  it  is  evidently  the  interest  of 
the  people  of  England  not  to  support  it ;  and  why  it  has 
been  supported  so  long,  against  the  clearest  demonstrations 
of  truth  and  national  advantage,  is  to  me,  and  must  be  to 
all  the  reasonable  world,  a  matter  of  astonishment.  Perhaps 
it  may  be  said  that  I  live  in  America,  and  write  this  from 
interest.  To  this  I  reply,  that  my  principle  is  universal. 
My  attachment  is  to  all  the  world,  and  not  to  any  particular 
part,  and  if  what  I  advance  is  right,  no  matter  where  or 
who  it  comes  from.  We  have  given  the  proclamation  of 
your  commissioners  a  currency  in  our  newspapers,  and  I 
have  no  doubt  you  will  give  this  a  place  in  yours.  To  oblige 
and  be  obliged  is  fair. 

Before  I  dismiss  this  Dart  of  my  address,  I  shall  mention 
one  more  circumstance  in  w1  *»  1 11  k  the  people  of  Eng- 
land have  been  equally  mistu*^-.  .  ~^a  then  proceed  to  other 
matters. 

There  is  such  an  idea  existing  in  the  world,  as  that  of 
national  honor,  and  this  falsely  understood,  is  oftentimes 
the  cause  of  war.  In  a  Christian  and  philosophical  sense, 
mankind  seem  to  have  stood  still  at  individual  civilization, 
and  to  retain  as  nations  all  the  original  rudeness  of  na- 
ture. Peace  by  treaty  is  only  a  cessation  of  violence  for  a 
reformation  of  sentiment.  It  is  a  substitute  for  a  principle 
that  is  wanting  and  ever  will  be  wanting  till  the  idea  ot 
national  honor  be  rightly  understood.  As  individuals  we 
profess  ourselves  Christians,  but  as  nations  we  are  heathens, 
Komans,  and  what  not.  I  remember  the  late  admiral 
Saunders  declaring  in  the  house  of  commons,  and  that  in 
the  time  of  peace,  "  That  the  city  of  Madrid  laid  in  ashes 
was  not  a  sufficient  atonement  for  the  Spaniards  taking  off 
the  rudder  of  an  English  sloop  of  war."  I  do  not  ask 
whether  this  is  Christianity  or  morality,  I  ask  whether  it  is 
decency  ?  whether  it  is  proper  language  for  a  nation  to 
use  ?  In  private  life  we  call  it  by  the  plain  name  of  bully- 
ing, and  the  elevation  of  rank  cannot  alter  its  character.  It 


96  THE   CRISIS. 

is,  I  think,  exceedingly  easy  to  define  what  ought  to  be 
understood  by  national  honor ;  for  that  which  is  the  best 
character  for  an  individual  is  the  best  character  for  a  na- 
tion ;  and  wherever  the  latter  exceeds  or  falls  beneath  the 
former,  there  is  a  departure  from  the  line  of  true  greatness. 

I  have  thrown  out  this  observation  with  a  design  of  apply- 
ing it  to  Great  Britain.  Her  ideas  of  national  honor,  seem 
devoid  of  that  benevolence  of  heart,  that  universal  expan- 
sion of  philanthropy,  and  that  triumph  over  the  rage  of  vul- 
gar prejudice,  without  which  man  is  inferior  to  himself,  and 
a  companion  of  common  animals.  To  know  whom  she  shall 
regard  or  dislike,  she  asks  what  country  they  are  of,  what 
religion  they  profess,  and  what  property  they  enjoy.  Her 
idea  of  national  honor  seems  to  consist  in  national  insult, 
and  that  to  be  a  great  people,  is  to  be  neither  a  Christian, 
a  philosopher,  or  a  gentleman,  but  to  threaten  with  the 
rudeness  of  a  bear,  and  to  devour  with  the  ferocity  of  a 
lion.  This  perhaps  may  sound  harsh  and  uncourtly,  but  it 
is  too  true,  and  the  more  is  the  pity. 

I  mention  this  only  as  her  general  character.  But  towards 
America  she  has  observed  no  character  at  all ;  and  destroyed 
by  her  conduct  what  she  assumed  in  her  title.  She  set  out 
with  the  title  of  parent,  or  mother  country.  The  association 
of  ideas  which  naturally  accompany  this  expression,  are 
filled  with  every  thing  that  is  fond,  tender  and  forbearing. 
They  have  an  energy  peculiar  to  themselves,  and,  overlook- 
ing the  accidental  attachment  of  common  affections,  apply 
with  infinite  softness  to  the  first  feelings  of  the  heart,  it  is 
a  political  term  which  every  mother  can  feel  the  force  of, 
a.  :  every  child  can  judge  of.  It  needs  no  painting  of  mine 
to  set  it  off,  for  nature  only  can  do  it  justice. 

But  has  any  part  of  your  conduct  to  America  corre- 
sponded with  the  title  you  set  up?  If  in  your  general 
national  character  you  are  unpolished  and  severe,  in  this 
you  are  inconsistent  and  unnatural,  and  you  must  have  ex- 
ceeding false  notions  of  national  honor,  to  suppose  that  the 
world  can  admire  a  want  of  humanity,  or  that  national 
honor  depends  on  the  violence  of  resentment,  the  inflexi- 
bility of  temper,  or  the  vengeance  of  execution. 

I  would  willingly  convince  you,  and  that  with  as  much 
temper  as  the  times  will  suffer  me  to  do,  that  as  you  opposed 
your  own  interest  by  quarrelling  with  us,  so  likewise  your 
national  honor,  rightly  conceived  and  understood,  wae  no 
ways  called  upon  to  enter  into  a  war  with  America  ;  had 


THE   CRISIS.  97 

you  studied  true  greatness  of  heart,  the  first  and  fairest  orna- 
ment of  mankind,  you  would  have  acted  directly  contrary 
to  all  that  you  have  done,  and  the  world  would  have 
ascribed  it  to  a  generous  cause ;  besides  which,  you  had 
(though  with  the  assistance  of  this  country)  secured  a  power- 
ful name  by  the  last  war.  You,  were  known  and  dreaded 
abroad ;  and  it  would  have  been  wise  in  you  to  have  suf- 
fered the  world  to  have  slept  undisturbed  under  that  idea. 
It  was  to  you  a  force  existing  without  expense.  It  produced 
to  you  all  the  advantages  of  real  power;  and  you  were 
stronger  through  the  universality  of  that  charm,  th:\..  any 
future  fleets  and  armies  may  probably  make  you.  Your 
greatness  was  so  secured  and  interwoven  with  your  silence, 
that  you  ought  never  to  have  awakened  mankind,  and  had 
nothing  to  do  but  to  be  quiet.  Had  you  been  true  politi- 
cians you  would  have  seen  all  this,  and  continued  to  draw 
from  the  magic  of  a  name,  the  force  and  authority  of  a 
nation. 

Unwise  as  you  were  in  breaking  the  charm,  you  were  still 
more  unwise  in  the  manner  of  doing  it.  Samson  only  told 
the  secret,  but  you  have  performed  the  operation ;  you  have 
shaven  your  own  head,  and  wantonly  thrown  away  the 
locks.  America  was  the  hair  from  which  the  charm  was 
drawn  that  infatuated  the  world.  You  ought  to  have  quar- 
relled with  no  power ;  but  with  her  upon  no  account.  Y  ou 
had  nothing  to  fear  from  any  condescension  you  might  make. 
You  might  have  humored  her,  even  if  there  had  been  no 
justice  in  her  claims,  without  any  risk  to  your  reputation ; 
lor  Europe,  fascinated  by  your  fame,  would  have  ascribed 
it  to  your  benevolence,  and  America,  intoxicated  by  the 
grant,  would  have  slumbered  in  her  fetters. 

But  this  method  of  studying  the  progress  of  the  passions, 
in  order  to  ascertain  the  probable  conduct  of  mankind,  is  a 
philosophy  in  politics  which  those  who  preside  at  St.  James's 
nave  no  conception  of.  They  know  no  other  influence  than 
corruption,  and  reckon  all  their  probabilities  from  prece- 
dent. A  new  case  is  to  them  a  new  world,  and  while  they 
are  seeking  for  a  parallel  they  get  lost.  The  talents  of  lord 
Mansfield  can  be  estimated  at  best  no  higher  than  those  of 
a  sophist.  He  understands  the  subtleties  but  not  the  ele- 
gance of  nature ;  and  by  continually  viewing  mankind 
through  the  cold  medium  of  the  law,  never  thinks  of  pene- 
trating into  the  warmer  /tsgion  of  the  mind.  As  for  lord 
North,  il  is  his  happiness  to  have  in  him  more  philosophy 


98  THE   CRISIS. 

than  sentiment,  for  he  bears  flogging  like  a  top,  and  sleeps 
the  better  for  it.  His  punishment  becomes  his  support,  for 
while  he  suffers  the  lash  for  his  sins,  he  keeps  himself  up  by 
twirling  about.  In  politics,  he  is  a  good  arithmetician,  and 
in  every  thing  else  nothing  at  all. 

There  is  one  circumstance  which  comes  so  much  within 
lord  North's  province  as  a  financier,  that  I  am  surprised  it 
should  escape  him,  which  is,  the  different  abilities  of  the  two 
countries  in  supporting  the  expense  :  for,  strange  as  it  may 
seem,  England  is  not  a  match  For  America  in  this  particular. 
By  a  curious  kind  of  revolution  in  accounts,  the  people  of 
England  seem  to  mistake  their  poverty  for  their  riches ;  that 
is,  they  reckon  their  national  debt  as  a  part  of  their  national 
wealth.  They  make  the  same  kind  of  error  which  a  man 
would  do,  who  after  mortgaging  his  estate,  should  add  the 
money  borrowed,  to  the  full  value  of  the  estate,  in  order  to 
count  up  his  worth,  and  in  this  case  he  would  conceive  that 
he  got  rich  by  running  into  debt.  Just  thus  it  is  with  Eng- 
land. The  government  owed  at  the  beginning  of  this  war 
one  hundred  and  thirty-five  millions  sterling,  and  though 
the  individuals  to  whom  it  was  due,  had  a  right  to  reckon 
their  shares  as  so  much  private  property,  yet  to  the  nation 
collectively  it  was  so  much  poverty.  There  is  as  effectual 
limits  to  public  debts  as  to  private  ones,  for  when  once  the 
money  borrowed  is  so  great  as  to  require  the  whole  yearly 
revenue  to  discharge  the  interest  thereon,  there  is  an  end  to 
further  borrowing  ;  in  the  same  manner  as  when  the  interest 
of  a  man's  debts  amounts  to  the  yearly  income  of  his  estate, 
there  is  an  end  to  his  credit.  This  is  nearly  the  case  with 
England,  the  interest  of  her  present  debt  being  at  least 
equal  to  one  half  of  her  yearly  revenue,  so  that  out  of  ten 
millions  annually  collected  by  taxes,  she  has  but  five  that 
she  can  call  her  own. 

The  very  reverse  of  this  was  the  case  with  America  ;  she 
began  the  war  without  any  debt  upon  her,  and  in  order  to 
carry  it  on,  she  neither  raised  money  by  taxes,  nor  borrowed 
it  upon  interest,  but  created  it ;  and  her  situation  at  this 
time  continues  so  much  the  reverse  of  yours  that  taxing 
would  make  her  rich,  whereas  it  would  make  you  poor 
When  we  shall  have  sunk  the  sum  which  we  have  created, 
we  shall  then  be  out  of  debt,  be  just  as  rich  as  when  we 
began,  and  all  the  while  we  are  doing  it  shall  feel  no  differ- 
ence, because  the  value  will  rise  as  the  quantity  decreases. 

There  was  not  a  country  in  the  world  so  capable  of  bear- 


mi;  CRISIS.  99 

ing  the  expense  of  a  war  as  America  ;  not  only  because  she 
was  not  in  debt  when  she  began,  but  because  the  country  is 
young  and  capable  of  infinite  improvement,  and  has  an 
almost  boundless  tract  of  new  lands  in  store  ;  whereas  Eng- 
land has  got  to  her  extent  of  age  and  growth,  and  has  no 
unoccupied  land  or  property  in  reserve.  The  one  is  like  a 
young  heir  coming  to  a  large  improvable  estate ;  the  other 
like  an  old  man  whose  chances  are  over,  and  his  estate 
mortgaged  for  half  its  worth. 

In  the  second  number  of  the  Crisis,  which  I  find  has  been 
republished  in  England,  I  endeavored  to  set  forth  the 
impracticability  of  conquering  America.  I  stated  every 
case,  that  I  conceived  could  possibly  happen,  and  ventured 
to  predict  its  consequences.  As  my  conclusions  were  drawn 
not  artfully,  but  naturally,  they  have  all  proved  to  be  true. 
I  was  upon  the  spot;  knew  the  politics  of  America,  her 
strength  and  resources,  and  by  a  train  of  services,  the  best 
in  my  power  to  render,  was  honored  with  the  friendship  of 
the  congress,  the  army  and  the  people.  I  considered  the 
cause  a  just  one.  I  know  and  feel  it  a  just  one,  and  under 
that  confidence  never  made  my  own  profit  or  loss  an  object. 
My  endeavor  was  to  have  the  matter  well  understood  on 
both  sides,  and  I  conceived  myself  tendering  a  general 
service,  by  setting  forth  to  the  one  the  impossibility  of  being 
conquered,  and  to  the  other  the  impossibility  of  conquering. 
Most  of  the  arguments  made  use  of  by  the  ministry  for  sup- 
porting the  war,  are  the  very  arguments  that  ought  to  have 
been  used  against  supporting  it ;  and  the  plans,  by  which 
they  thought  to  conquer,  are  the  very  plans  in  which  they 
were  sure  to  be  defeated.  They  have  taken  every  thing  up 
at  the  wrong  end.  Their  ignorance  is  astonishing,  and  were 
you  in  my  situation  you  would  see  it.  They  may,  perhaps, 
have  your  confidence,  but  I  am  persuaded  that  they  would 
make  very  indifferent  members  of  congress.  I  know  what 
England  is,  and  what  America  is,  and  from  the  compound 
of  knowledge,  am  better  enabled  to  judge  of  the  issue,  than 
what  the  king  or  any  of  his  ministers  can  be. 

In  this  number  I  nave  endeavored  to  show  the  ill  policy 
and  disadvantages  of  the  war.  I  believe  many  of  my  remarks 
are  new.  Those  whicli  are  not  so,  I  have  studied  to  improve 
and  place  in  a  manner  that  may  be  clear  and  striking.  Y  our 
failure  is,  I  am  persuaded,  as  certain  as  fate.  America  is 
above  your  reach.  She  is  at  least  your  equal  in  the  world, 
and  her  independence  neither  rests  upon  your  consent,  nor 


100  THE  GBI8I8. 

can  it  be  prevented  by  your  arms.  In  short,  you  spend 
your  substance  in  vain,  and  impoverish  yourselves  without 
a  hope. 

But  suppose  you  had  conquered  America,  what  advan- 
tages, collectively  or  individually,  as  merchants,  manufac- 
turers, or  conquerors,  could  you  have  looked  for.  This  is  an 
object  you  seemed  never  to  have  attended  to.  Listening  for 
the  sound  of  victory,  and  led  away  by  the  phrenzy  of  arms, 
you  neglected  to  reckon  either  the  cost  or  the  consequences. 
Y  ou  must  all  pay  towards  the  expense  ;  the  poorest  among 
you  must  bear  his  share,  and  it  is  both  your  right  and  your 
duty  to  weigh  seriously  the  matter.  Had  America  been 
Conquered,  she  might  have  been  parcelled  out  in  grants  to 
the  favorites  at  court,  but  no  share  of  it  would  have  fallen 
to  you.  Your  taxes  would  not  have  been  lessened,  because  she 
would  have  been  in  no  condition  to  have  paid  any  towards 
your  relief.  We  are  rich  by  a  contrivance  of  our  own,  which 
would  have  ceased  as  soon  as  you  became  masters.  Our 
paper  money  will  be  of  no  use  in  England,  and  silver  and 
gold  we  have  none.  In  the  last  war  you  made  many  con- 
quests, but  were  any  of  your  taxes  lessened  thereby?  On 
the  contrary,  were  you  not  taxed  to  pay  for  the  charge  of 
making  them,  and  have  not  the  same  been  the  case  in  every 
war? 

To  the  parliament  I  wish  to  address  myself  in  a  more  par- 
ticular manner.  They  appear  to  have  supposed  themselves 
partners  in  the  chase,  and  to  have  hunted  with  the  lion  from 
an  expectation  of  a  right  in  the  booty ;  but  in  this  it  is  most 
probable  they  would,  as  legislators,  have  been  disappointed. 
The  case  is  quite  a  new  one,  and  many  unforeseen  difficulties 
would  have  arisen  thereon.  The  parliament  claimed  a 
legislative  right  over  America,  and  the  war  originated  from 
that  pretence.  But  the  army  is  supposed  to  belong  to  the 
crown,  and  if  America  had  been  conquered  through  their 
means,  the  claim  of  the  legislature  would  have  been  suffo- 
cated in  the  conquest.  Ceded,  or  conquered,  countries  are 
supposed  to  be  out  of  the  authority  of  parliament.  Taxation 
is  exercised  over  them  by  prerogative  and  not  by  law.  It 
was  attempted  to  be  done  in  the  Granadas  a  few  years  ago, 
and  the  only  reason  why  it  was  not  done  was  because  the 
crown  had  made  a  prior  relinquishment  of  its  claim.  There- 
fore, parliament  have  been  all  this  while  supporting  measures 
for  the  establishment  of  their  authority,  in  the  same  issue  of 
which,  they  would  have  been  triumphed  over  by  the  prero- 


THE   CRISIS.  101 

gative.  This  might  have  opened  a  new  and  interesting 
opposition  between  the  parkament  and  the  crown.  The 
crown  would  have  said  that  it  conquered  for  itself,  and  that 
to  conquer  for  parliament  was  an  unknown  case.  The  par- 
liament might  nave  replied,  that  America  not  being  a  for- 
eign country,  but  a  country  in  rebellion,  could  not  be  said 
to  be  conquered,  but  reduced;  and  thus  continued  their 
claim  by  disowning  the  term.  The  crown  might  have  re- 
joined, that  however  America  might  be  considered  at  first, 
she  became  foreign  at  last  by  a  declaration  of  independence, 
and  a  treaty  with  France  ;  and  that  her  case  being,  by  that 
treaty,  put  within  the  law  of  nations,  was  out  of  the  law  of 
parliament,  who  might  have  maintained,  that  as  their  claim 
over  America  had  never  been  surrendered,  so  neither  could 
it  be  taken  away.  The  crown  might  have  insisted,  that 
though  the  claim  of  parliament  could  not  be  taken  away, 
yet,  being  an  inferior,  it  might  be  superseded ;  and  that, 
whether  the  claim  was  withdrawn  from  the  object,  or  the 
object  taken  from  the  claim,  the  same  separation  ensued  ; 
and  that  America  being  subdued  after  a  treaty  with  France, 
was  to  all  intents  and  purposes  a  regal  conquest,  and  of 
course  the  sole  property  of  the  king.  The  parliament,  as 
the  legal  delegates  of  the  people,  might  have  contended 
against  the  term  "  inferior,  and  rested  the  case  upon  the 
antiquity  of  power,  and  this  would  have  brought  on  a  set  of 
very  interesting  and  rational  questions. 

1st,  What  is  the  original  fountain  of  power  and  honor  in 
any  country  ? 

2d,  Whether  the  prerogative  does  not  belong  to  the 
people  ? 

3d,  Whether  there  is  any  such  thing  as  the  English  con- 
stitution ? 

4th,  Of  what  use  is  the  crown  to  the  people  ? 

5th,  Whether  he  who  invented  a  crown  was  not  an  enemy 
to  mankind  ? 

6th,  Whether  it  is  not  a  shame  for  a  man  to  spend  a 
million  a  year  and  do  no  good  for  it,  and  whether  the  money 
might  not  be  better  applied  ? 

7th,  Whether  such  a  man  is  not  better  dead  than  alive  ? 

8th,  Whether  a  congress,  constituted  like  that  of  Ame- 
rica, is  not  the  most  happy  and  consistent  form  of  govern- 
ment in  the  world  ? — With  a  number  of  others  of  the  same 
import. 

In  short,  the  contention  about  thr   dividend  might  have 


102  fHE   CRISIS. 

distracted  the  nation  ;  for  nothing  is  more  common  than  to 
agree  in  the  conquest  and  quarrel  for  the  prize ;  there- 
fore it  is,  perhaps,  a  happy  circumstance,  that  our  successes 
have  prevented  the  dispute. 

If  the  parliament  had  been  thrown  out  in  their  claim,  which 
it  is  most  probable  they  would,  the  nation  likewise  would 
have  been  thrown  out  in  their  expectation  ;  for  as  the  taxes 
would  have  been  laid  on  by  the  crown  without  the  parlia- 
ment, the  revenue  arising  therefrom,  if  any  could  have 
arisen,  would  not  have  gone  into  the  exchequer,  but  into 
the  privy  purse,  and  so  far  from  lessening  the  taxes,  would 
not  even  have  been  added  to  them,  but  served  only  as 
pocket  money  to  the  crown.  The  more  I  reflect  on  this 
matter,  the  more  I  am  astonished  at  the  blindness  and  ill 
policy  of  my  countrymen,  whose  wisdom  seems  to  operate 
without  discernment,  and  their  strength  without  an  object. 

To  the  great  bulwark  of  the  nation,  I  mean  the  mercantile 
and  manufacturing  part  thereof,  I  likewise  presen  fc  my  ad- 
dress. It  is  your  interest  to  see  America  an  independent, 
and  IK  t  a  conquered  country.  If  conquered,  she  is  ruined ; 
and  if  ruined,  poor ;  consequently  the  trade  will  be  a  trifle, 
and  her  credit  doubtful.  If  independent,  she  flourishes,  and 
from  her  flourishing  must  your  profits  arise.  It  matters 
nothing  to  you  who  governs  America,  if  your  manufactures 
find  a  consumption  there.  Some  articles  will  consequently 
be  obtained  from  other  places,  and  it  is  right  that  they 
should ;  but  the  demand  for  others  will  increase,  by  the 
great  influx  of  inhabitants  which  a  state  of  independence 
and  peace  will  occasion,  and  in  the  final  event  you  may  be 
enriched.  The  commerce  of  America  is  perfectly  free,  and 
ever  will  be  so.  She  will  consign  away  no  part  of  it  to  any 
nation.  She  has  not  to  her  friends,  and  certainly  will  not 
to  her  enemies,  though  it  is  probable  that  your  narrow- 
minded  politicians,  thinking  to  please  you  thereby,  may 
some  time  or  other  unnecessarily  make  such  a  proposal. 
Trade  flourishes  best  when  it  is  rree,  and  it  is  weaJt  policy 
to  attempt  to  fetter  it.  Her  treaty  with  France  is  on  the 
most  liberal  and  generous  principles,  and  the  French,  in 
their  conduct  towards  her,  have  proved  themselves  to  be 
philosophers,  politicians  and  gentlemen. 

To  the  ministry  I  likewise  address  myself.  You,  gentle- 
men, have  studied  the  ruin  of  your  country,  from  which  it 
--s  not  within  your  abilities  to  rescue  her.  Your  attempts 
tc  recover  her  are  as  ridiculous  as  your  plans  which  in 


THE  CRD«*  108 


volved  her  are  detestable.  The  CCJIIL.**.  iers,  being  about 
to  depart,  will  probably  bring  you  this,  and  with  it  my  sixtl 
number  addressed  to  them  ;  ana  in  so  doing  they  carry  back 
more  Common  Sense  than  they  brought,  and  you  likewise 
will  have  more  than  when  you  sent  them. 

Having  thus  addressed  you  severally,  I  conclude  by  ad 
dressing  you  collectively.  It  is  a  long  lane  that  has  no  turn 
ing.  A  period  of  sixteen  years  of  misconduct  and  misfor- 
tune, is  certainly  long  enough  for  any  one  nation  to  suffer 
under  ;  and  upon  a  supposition  that  war  is  not  declared  be- 
tween France  and  you,  I  beg  to  place  a  line  of  conduct 
before  you  that  will  easily  lead  you  out  of  all  your  trou- 
bles. It  has  been  hinted  before,  and  cannot  be  too  much  at- 
tended to. 

Suppose  America  had  remained  unknown  to  Europe  till 
the  present  year,  and  that  Mr.  Banks  and  Dr.  Solander,  in 
another  voyage  round  the  world,  had  made  the  first  dis- 
covery of  ner,  in  the  same  condition  that  she  is  now  in,  of 
arts,  arms,  numbers  and  civilization.  What,  I  ask,  in  that 
case,  would  have  been  your  conduct  towards  her  ?  For  that 
will  point  out  what  it  ought  to  be  now.  The  problems  and 
their  solutions  are  equal,  and  the  right  line  of  the  one  is  the 
parallel  of  the  other.  The  question  takes  in  every  circum- 
stance that  can  possibly  arise.  It  reduces  politics  to  a  sim- 
ple thought,  and  is  moreover  a  mode  of  investigation,  in 
which,  while  you  are  studying  your  interest  the  simplicity 
of  the  case  will  cheat  you  into  good  temper.  You  have 
nothing  to  do  but  to  suppose  that  you  have  found  America, 
and  she  appears  found  to  your  hand,  and  while  in  the  joy  of 
your  heart  you  stand  still  to  admire  her,  the  path  of  poKtici 
rises  straight  before  you. 

Were  I  disposed  to  paint  a  contrast,  I  could  easily  set  oft 
what  you  have  done  in  the  present  case,  against  what  you 
would  have  done  in  that  case,  and  by  justly  opposing  them, 
conclude  a  picture  that  would  make  you  blush.  But,  as  when 
any  of  the  prouder  passions  are  hurt,  it  is  much  better  phi- 
losophy to  let  a  man  slip  into  a  good  temper  than  to  attack 
him  in  a  bad  one  ;  for  tnat  reason,  therefore,  I  only  state  the 
case,  and  leave  you  to  reflect  upon  it. 

To  go  a  little  back  into  politics,  it  will  be  found  that  th* 
true  interest  of  Britain  lay  in  proposing  and  promoting  the 
independence  of  America  immediately  after  the  last  peace  ; 
for  the  expense  which  Britain  had  then  incurred  by  defending 
America  as  her  own  dominions,  ought  to  have  shown  hei 


104  THE   CRISIS. 

the  policy  and  necebsity  of  changing  ihe  style  of  the  country, 
as  the  best  probable  method  of  preventing  future  wars  and 
expense,  and  the  only  method  by  which  she  could  hold  the 
commerce  without  the  charge  of  sovereignty.  Besides  which, 
the  title  which  she  assumed,  of  parent  country,  led  to,  and 
pointed  out  the  propriety,  wisdom  and  advantage  of  a  sepa- 
ration ;  for,  as  in  private  life,  children  grow  into  men,  and 
by  setting  up  for  themselves,  extend  and  secure  the  interest 
of  the  whole  family,  so  in  the  settlement  of  colonies  large 
enough  to  admit  of  maturity,  the  same  policy  should  be 
pursued,  and  the  same  consequences  would  follow.  Nothing 
hurts  the  affections  both  of  parents  and  children  so  much, 
as  living  too  closely  connected,  and  keeping  up  the  distinc- 
tion too  long.  Domineering  will  not  do  over  those,  who,  by 
a  progress  in  life,  have  become  equal  in  rank  to  their  parents, 
that  is,  when  they  have  families  of  their  own ;  and  though 
they  may  conceive  themselves  the  subject  of  their  advice, 
will  not  suppose  them  the  objects  of  tneir  government.  I 
do  not,  by  drawing  this  parallel,  mean  to  admit  the  title  of 
parent  country,  because,  if  it  is  due  any  where,  it  is  due  to 
Europe  collectively,  and  the  first  settlers  from  England  were 
driven  here  by  persecution.  I  mean  only  to  introduce  the 
term  for  the  sake  of  policy  and  to  show  from  your  title  the 
line  of  your  interest. 

When  you  saw  the  state  of  strength  and  opulence,  and 
that  by  her  own  industry,  which  America  had  arrived  at, 
you  ought  to  have  advised  her  to  set  up  for  herself,  and  pro- 
posed an  alliance  of  interest  with  her,  and  in  so  doing  you 
would  have  drawn,  and  that  at  her  own  expense,  more  real 
advantage,  and  more  military  supplies  and  assistance,  both 
of  ships  and  men,  than  from  any  weak  and  wrangling  gov- 
ernment that  you  could  exercise  over  her.  In  short,  nad 
you  studied  only  the  domestic  politics  of  a  family,  you 
would  have  learned  how  to  govern  the  state ;  but,  instead 
of  this  easy  and  natural  line,  you  flew  out  into  every  thing 
which  was  wild  and  outrageous,  till,  by  following  the  pas- 
sion and  stupidity  of  the  pilot,  you  wrecked  the  vessel  wiihin 
sight  of  the  shore. 

Having  shown  what  you  ought  to  have  done,  I  now  pro- 
ceed to  show  why  it  was  not  done.  The  caterpillar  circle 
of  the  court,  had  an  interest  to  pursue,  distinct  from,  and 
opposed  to  yours ;  for  though  by  the  independence  of  America 
and  an  alliance  therewith,  the  trade  would  have  continued, 
if  not  increased,  as  in  many  articles  neither  country  can  go 


THE    CRIST?.  105 

to  a  better  market,  and  though  by  defending  and  protecting 
herself,  she  would  have  been  no  expense  to  you,  and  conse- 
quently your  national  charges  would  have  decreased,  and 
your  taxes  might  have  been  proportionably  lessened  thereby ; 
yet  the  striking  off  so  many  places  from  the  court  calendar 
was  put  in  opposition  to  the  interest  of  the  nation.  The  loss 
of  thirteen  government  ships,  with  their  appendages,  here 
and  in  England,  is  a  shocking  sound  in  the  ear  of  a  hungry 
courtier.  Your  present  king  and  ministry  will  be  the  ruin 
of  you ;  and  you  had  better  risk  a  revolution  and  call  a 
congress,  than  be  thus  led  on  from  madness  to  despair,  and 
from  despair  to  ruin.  America  has  set  you  the  example,  and 
you  may  follow  it  and  be  free. 

I  now  come  to  the  last  part,  a  war  with  France.  This  is 
what  no  man  in  his  senses  will  advise  you  to,  and  all  good 
men  would  wish  to  prevent.  "Whether  France  will  declare 
war  against  you,  is  not  for  me  in  this  place  to  mention,  or 
to  hint,  even  if  I  knew  it ;  but  it  must  be  madness  in  you 
to  do  it  first.  The  matter  is  come  now  to  a  full  crisis,  and 
peace  is  easy  if  willingly  set  about.  Whatever  you  may 
think,  France  has  behaved  handsomely  to  you.  She  would 
have  been  unjust  to  herself  to  have  acted  otherwise  than  she 
did ;  and  having  accepted  our  offer  of  alliance,  she  gave 
you  genteel  notice  of  it.  There  was  nothing  in  her  conduct 
reserved  or  indelicate,  and  while  she  announced  her  deter- 
mination to  support  her  treaty,  she  left  you  to  give  the  first 
offence.  America,  on  her  part,  has  exhibited  a  character  of 
firmness  to  the  world.  Unprepared  and  unarmed,  without 
form  or  government,  she  singly  opposed  a  nation  that  domi- 
neered ove'r  half  the  globe.  The  greatness  of  the  deed 
demands  respect ;  and  though  you  may  feel  resentment,  you 
are  compelled  both  to  wonder  and  admire. 

Here  I  rest  my  arguments  and  finish  my  address.  Such 
as  it  is,  it  is  a  gift,  and  you  are  welcome.  It  was  always 
my  design  to  dedicate  a  Crisis  to  you,  when  the  time  should 
come  that  would  properly  make  it  a  Crisis  ;  and  when,  like- 
wise I  should  catch  myself  in  a  temper  to  write  it,  and  sup- 
pose you  in  a  condition  to  read  it.  That  time  has  now 
arrived,  and  with  it  the  opportunity  of  conveyance.  For 
the  commissioners — -poor  commissioners  !  having  proclaimed, 
that  "  yet  forty  days  and  Nineveh  shall  be  overthrown  /" 
have  waited  out  the  date,  and,  discontented  with  their  God, 
are  returning  to  their  gourd.  And  all  the  harm  I  wish 
them  is,  that  it  may  not  wither  about  their  ears,  and 


106  THE   CRISIS. 

that   they  may  not  make  their  exit  in  the   belly  of   a 
whale. 

COMMON  SENSE 

Philadelphia,  Nov.  21,  1778. 

P.  S.  Though  in  the  tranquillity  of  my  mind  I  have  con- 
cluded with  a  laugh,  yet  I  have  something  to  mention  to  the 
commissioners,  which,  to  them,  is  serious  and  worthy  their 
attention.  Their  authority  is  derived  from  an  act  of  parlia- 
ment, which  likewise  describes  and  limits  their  official 
powers.  Their  commission,  therefore,  is  only  a  recital,  and 
personal  investiture,  of  those  powers,  or  a  nomination  and 
description  of  the  persons  who  are  to  execute  them.  Had  it 
contained  any  thing  contrary^  to,  or  gone  beyond  the  line  of, 
the  written  law  from  which  it  is  derived,  and  by  which  it  is 
bound,  it  would,  by  the  English  constitution,  have  been 
treason  in  Cj  crown,  and  the  king  been  subject  to  an  im- 
peachment. He  dared  not,  therefore,  put  in  his  commission 
what  you  have  put  in  your  proclamation,  that  is,  he  dared 
not  have  authorised  you  in  that  commission  to  burn  and 
destroy  any  thing  in  America.  You  are  both  in  the  act  and 
in  the  commission  styled  commissioners  for  restoring  peace, 
and  the  methods  for  doing  it  are  there  pointed  out.  Your 
last  proclamation  is  signed  by  you  as  commissioners  under 
that  act.  You  make  parliament  the  patron  of  its  contents. 
Yet,  in  the  body  of  it,  yeu  insert  matters  contrary  both  to 
the  spirit  and  letter  of  the  act,  and  what  likewise  your  king 
dared  not  have  put  in  his  commission  to  you.  The  state  of 
things  in  England,  gentlemen,  is  too  ticklish  for  you  to  run 
hazards.  You  are  accountable  to  parliament  for  tlie  execu- 
tion of  that  act  according  to  the  letter  of  it.  Your  heads 
may  pay  for  breaking  it,  for  you  certainly  have  broke  it  by 
exceeding  it.  And  as  a  friend,  who  would  wish  you  to 
escape  the  paw  of  the  lion,  as  well  as  the  belly  of  the  whale, 
I  civilly  hint  to  you,  to  keep  within  compass. 

Sir  Harry  Clinton,  strictly  speaking,  is  as  accountable  as 
the  rest;  K>r  though  a  general,  he  is  likewise  a  commis- 
sioner, acting  under  a  superior  authority.  His  first  obedi- 
ence is  due  to  the  act ;  and  his  plea  of  being  a  general,  will 
not  and  cannot  clear  him  as  a  commissioner,  for  that  would 
suppose  the  crown,  in  its  single  capacity,  to  have  a  power 
of  dispensing  with  an  act  of  parliament.  Your  situation, 

fBntlemen,  is  nice  and  critical,  and  the  more  so  because 
ngland  is  unsettled.     Take  heed !  Remember  the  times  of 


THE   CRISIS.  10? 

Charles  the  first !     For  Laud  and  Stafford  fell  by  trusting 
to  a  hope  like  yours. 

Having  thus  shown  you  the  danger  of  your  proclamation, 
I  now  show  you  the  folly  of  it.  The  means  contradict 
your  design  ;  you  threaten  to  lay  waste,  in  order  to  render 
America  a  useless  acquisition  of  alliance  to  France.  I 
reply,  that  the  more  destruction  you  commit  (if  you  could 
do  it)  the  more  valuable  to  France  you  make  that  alliance. 
Fou  can  destroy  only  houses  and  goods ;  and  by  BO  doing 
you  increase  our  demand  upon  her  for  materials  and  mer- 
chandize; for  the  wants  of  one  nation,  provided  it  has 
freedom  and  credit,  naturally  produces  riches  to  the  other ; 
and,  as  you  can  neither  ruin  tne  land  nor  prevent  the  vege- 
tation, you  would  increase  the  exportation  of  our  pro- 
duce in  payment,  which  would  be  to  her  a  new  fond  of 
wealth.  In  short,  had  you  cast  about  for  a  plan  or  purpose 
to  enrich  your  enemies,  you  could  not  have  hit  upon  a 
better. 

C.  8. 


NUMBER    VIII. 
ADDRESSED  TO  THE  PEOPLE  OF  ENGLAND. 

"  TRUSTING  (says  the  king  of  England  in  his  speech  ol 
November  last,)  in  the  divine  providence,  and  in  the  justice 
of  my  cause,  I  am  firmly  resolved  to  prosecute  the  war  with 
vigor,  and  to  make  every  exertion  in  order  to  compel  our 
enemies  to  equitable  terms  of  peace  and  accommodation." 
To  this  declaration  the  United  States  of  America,  and  the 
confederated  powers  of  Europe  will  reply,  if  Britain  witt 
ha/oe  war,  she  shall  'have  enough  of  it. 

Five  years  have  nearly  elapsed  since  the  commencement 
of  hostilities,  and  every  campaign,  by  a  gradual  decay,  has 
lessened  your  ability  to  conquer,  without  producing  a  seri- 
ous thought  on  your  condition  or  your  fate.  Like  a  prodigal 
lingering  in  an  habitual  consumption,  you  feel  the  relics  of 
life,  and  mistake  them  for  recovery.  New  schemes,  like  new 
medicines,  have  administered  fresh  hopes,  and  prolonged  the 
disease  instead  of  curing  it.  A  change  of  generals,  like  a 
change  of  physicians,  served  only  to  keep  the  flattery  alive, 
and  furnish  new  pretences  for  a  new  extravagance. 


iOS  THE    CKI8I8. 

u  Can  Britain  fail  f"*  Has  been  proudly  asked  at  the 
undertaking  of  every  enterprise,  ana  that  "  whatever  she 
wills  is  fate"-^  has  been  given  with  the  solemnity  of  pro- 
phetic confidence,  and  though  the  question  has  been  con- 
stantly replied  to  by  disappointment,  and  the  prediction 
falsified  by  misfortune,  yet  still  the  insult  continued,  and 
your  catalogue  of  national  evils  increased  therewith.  Eager 
to  persuade  the  world  of  her  power,  she  considered  destruc- 
tion as  the  minister  of  greatness,  and  conceived  that  the 
glory  of  a  nation,  like  that  of  an  Indian,  lay  in  the  number 
of  its  scalps  and  the  miseries  which  it  inflicts. 

Fire,  sword  and  want,  as  far  as  the  arms  of  Britain  could 
extend  them,  have  been  spread  with  wanton  cruelty  along 
the  coast  of  America  ;  and  while  yon,  remote  from  the  scene 
of  suffering,  had  nothing  to  lose  and  as  little  to  dread,  the 
information  reached  you  like  a  tale  of  antiquity,  in  which 
the  distance  of  time  defaces  the  conception,  and  changes  the 
severest  sorrows  into  conversable  amusement. 

This  makes  the  second  paper,  addressed  perhaps  in  vain 
to  the  people  of  England.  That  advice  should  be  taken 
wherever  example  has  failed  ;  or  precept  be  regarded  where 
warning  is  ridiculed,  is  like  a  picture  of  hope  resting  on  de- 
spair ;  but  when  time  shall  stamp  with  universal  currency, 
the  facts  you  have  long  encountered  with  a  laugh,  and  tne 
irresistible  evidence  of  accumulated  losses,  like  the  hand 
writing  on  the  wall,  shall  add  terror  to  distress,  you  will 
then,  in  a  conflict  of  suffering,  learn  to  sympathise  with 
others  by  feeling  for  yourselves. 

The  triumphant  appearance  of  the  combined  fleets  in  the 
channel  and  at  your  harbor's  mouth,  and  the  expedition  of 
captain  Paul  Jones,  on  the  western  and  eastern  coasts  of 
England  and  Scotland,  will,  by  placing  you  in  the  condi- 
tion of  an  endangered  country,  read  to  you  a  stronger  lec- 
ture on  the  calamities  of  invasion,  and  bring  to  your  minds 
a  truer  picture  of  promiscuous  distress,  than  the  most  fin- 
ished rhetoric  can  describe  or  the  keenest  imagination  con- 
ceive. 

Hitherto  you  have  experienced  the  expenses,  but  nothing 
of  the  miseries  of  war.  Your  disappointments  have  been 
accompanied  with  no  immediate  suffering,  and  your  losses 
came  to  you  only  by  intelligence.  Like  fire  at  a  distance 

*  Whitebead's  new-year's  ode  for  1776. 

f  Ode  at  the  installation  of  lord  North,  for  Chancellor  of  the  university  of 
Oxford. 


THE   OKI8I8.  109 

you  heard  not  even  the  cry ;  you  felt  not  the  danger,  you 
Baw  not  the  confusion.  To  you  everything  has  been  foreign 
but  the  taxes  to  support  it.  You  knew  not  what  it  was  to 
be  alarmed  at  midnight  with  an  armed  enemy  in  the  streets. 
Yon  were  strangers  to  the  distressing  scene  of  a  family  in 
flight,  and  to  the  thousand  restless  cares  and  tender  sorrows 
that  incessantly  arose.  To  see  women  and  children  wander- 
in^  in  the  severity  of  winter,  with  the  broken  remains  of  a 
well-furnished  house,  and  seeking  shelter  in  every  crib  and 
hut,  were  matters  that  you  had  no  conception  of.  Y  ou  knew 
not  what  it  was  to  stand  by  and  see  your  goods  chopped  for 
fuel,  and  your  beds  ripped  to  pieces  to  make  packages  for 
plunder.  The  misery  of  others,  like  a  tempestuous  night, 
added  to  the  pleasures  of  your  own  security.  You  even  en- 
joyed the  storm,  by  contemplating  the  difference  of  condi- 
tions, and  that  which  carried  sorrow  into  the  breasts  of 
thousands,  served  but  to  heighten  in  you  a  species  of  tran- 
quil pride. — Yet  these  are  but  the  fainter  sufferings  of  war, 
when  compared  with  carnage  and  slaughter,  the  miseries  of 
a  military  nospital,  or  a  town  in  flames. 

The  people  of  America,  by  anticipating  distress,  had 
fortified  their  minds  against  every  species  you  could  inflict. 
They  had  resolved  to  abandon  their  homes,  to  resign  them 
to  destruction,  and  to  seek  new  settlements  rather  tnan  sub- 
mit. Thus  familiarized  to  misfortune,  before  it  arrived,  they 
bore  their  portion  with  the  less  regret :  the  justness  of  their 
cause  was  a  continual  source  of  consolation,  and  the  hope  of 
final  victory,  which  never  left  them,  served  to  lighten  the 
load  and  sweeten  the  cup  allotted  them  to  drink. 

But  when  their  troubles  shall  become  yours,  and  invasion 
be  transferred  upon  the  invaders,  you  will  have  neither  their 
extended  wilderness  to  fly  to,  their  cause  to  comfort  you,  nor 
their  hope  to  rest  upon.  Distress  with  them  was  sharpened 
by  no  self-reflection.  They  had  not  brought  it  on  themselves. 
On  the  contrary,  they  had  by  every  proceeding  endeavored 
to  avoid  it,  and  had  descended  even  below  the  mark  of  con- 
gressional character,  to  prevent  a  war.  The  national  honor 
or  the  advantages  of  independence  were  matters,  which  at 
the  commencement  of  the  dispute,  they  had  never  studied, 
and  it  was  only  at  the  last  moment  that  the  measure  was 
resolved  on.  Thus  circumstanced,  they  naturally  and  con- 
scientiously felt  a  dependance  upon  providence.  They  had 
a  clear  pretension  to  it,  and  had  they  failed  therein,  infidelity 
had  gained  a  triumph 


110  THE   CRISIS. 

But  your  condition  is  the  reverse  of  theirs.  Every  thing 
you  suner  you  have  sought :  nay,  had  you  created  mischiefi 
on  purpose  to  inherit  them,  you  could  not  have  secured  your 
title  by  a  firmer  deed.  The  world  awakens  with  no  pity  at 
your  complaints.  You  felt  none  for  others;  you  deserve 
none  for  yourselves.  Nature  does  not  interest  herself  in 
cases  like  yours,  but,  on  the  contrary,  turns  from  them  with 
dislike,  and  abandons  them  to  punishment.  You  may  now 
present  memorials  to  what  court  you  please,  but  so  far  as 
America  is  the  object,  none  will  listen.  The  policy  of  Europe, 
and  the  propensity  there  in  every  mind  to  curb  insulting 
ambition,  and  bring  cruelty  to  judgment,  are  unitedly 
against  you ;  and  where  nature  and  interest  reinforce  eacn 
other,  the  compact  is  too  intimate  to  be  dissolved. 

Make  but  the  case  of  others  your  own,  and  your  own 
theirs,  and  you  will  then  have  a  clear  idea  of  the  whole 
Had  France  acted  towards  her  colonies  as  you  have  done, 
you  would  have  branded  her  with  every  epithet  of  abhor- 
rence ;  and  had  you,  like  her,  stepped  in  to  succour  a 
struggling  people,  all  Europe  must  have  echoed  with  your 
own  applauses.  But  entangled  in  the  passion  of  dispute, 
you  see  it  not  as  you  ought,  and  form  opinions'thereon  which 
suit  with  no  interest  but  your  own.  You  wonder  that 
America  does  not  rise  in  union  with  you  to  impose  on  her- 
self a  portion  of  your  taxes  and  reduce  herself  to  uncon- 
ditional submission.  You  are  amazed  that  the  southern 
powers  of  Europe  do  not  assist  you  in  conquering  a  country 
which  is  afterwards  to  be  turned  against  themselves ;  and 
that  the  northern  ones  do  not  contribute  to  reinstate  you  in 
America  who  already  enjoy  the  market  for  naval  stores  by 
the  separation.  You  seem  surprised  that  Holland  does  not 
pour  in  her  succours,  to  maintain  you  mistress  of  the  seas, 
when  her  own  commerce  is  suffering  by  your  act  of  naviga- 
tion; or  that  any  country  should  study  her  own  interest 
while  yours  is  on  the  carpet. 

Such  excesses  of  passionate  folly,  and  unjust  as  well  aa 
unwise  resentment,  have  driven  you  on,  like  Pharaoh,  to 
nil  pitied  miseries,  and  while  the  importance  of  the  quarrel 
shall  perpetuate  your  disgrace,  the  flag  of  America  will 
carry  it  round  the  world.  The  natural  feelings  of  every 
rational  being  will  be  against  you,  and  wherever  the  story 
shall  be  told,  you  will  have  neither  excuse  nor  consolation 
left.  With  an  unsparing  hand,  and  an  insatiable  mind,  you 
have  desolated  the  world,  to  gain  dominion  and  to  lose  it ; 


THE   OBI8I8.  Ill 

and  while,  in  a  phrenzy  of  avarice  and  ambition,  the  east 
and  the  west  are  doomed  to  tributary  bondage,  yon  rapidly 
earned  destruction  as  the  wages  of  a  nation. 

At  the  thoughts  of  a  war  at  home,  every  man  amongst 
you  ought  to  tremble.  The  prospect  is  far  more  dreadful 
there  than  in  America.  Here  the  party  that  was  against 
the  measures  of  the  continent  were  in  general  composed  of 
a  kind  of  neutrals,  who  added  strength  to  neither  army. 
There  does  not  exist  a  being  so  devoid  of  sense  and  senti- 
ment as  to  covet  " unconditional  submission"  and  therefore 
no  man  in  America  could  be  with  you  in  principle.  Several 
might  from  cowardice  of  mind,  prefer  it  to  the  hardships 
and  dangers  of  opposing  it ;  but  the  same  disposition  that 
gave  them  such  a  choice,  unfitted  them  to  act  either  for  or 
against  us.  But  England  is  rent  into  parties,  with  equal 
shares  of  resolution.  The  principle  whicn  produced  the  war 
divides  the  nation.  Their  animosities  are  in  the  highest 
state  of  fermentation,  and  both  sides,  by  a  call  of  the  militia, 
are  in  arms.  n  No  human  foresight  can  discern,  no  conclu- 
sion can  be  formed,  what  turn  a  war  might  take,  if  once  set 
on  foot  by  an  invasion.  She  is  not  now  in  a  fit  disposition 
to  make  a  common  cause  of  her  own  affairs,  and  having  no 
conquests  to  hope  for  abroad,  and  nothing  but  expenses 
arising  at  home,  her  every  thing  is  staked  upon  a  defensive 
combat,  and  the  further  she  goes  the  worse  she  is  off. 

There  are  situations  that  a  nation  may  be  in,  in  which 
peace  or  war,  abstracted  from  every  other  consideration, 
may  be  politically  right  or  wrong.  When  nothing  can  be 
lost  by  a  war,  but  what  must  be  lost  without  it,  war  is  then 
the  policy  of  that  country  ;  and  such  was  the  situation  of 
America  at  the  commencement  of  hostilities  ;  but  when  no 
security  can  be  gained  by  a  war,  but  what  may  be  accom- 
plished by  a  peace,  the  case  becomes  reversed,  and  such  now 
is  the  situation  of  England. 

That  America  is  beyond  the  reach  of  conquest,  is  a  fact 
which  experience  has  shown  and  time  confirmed,  and  this 
admitted,  what,  I  ask,  is  now  the  object  of  contention?  If 
there  be  any  honor  in  pursuing  self-destruction  with  inflexi- 
ble passion — if  national  suicide  be  the  perfection  of  national 
glory,  you  may,  with  all  the  pride  01  criminal  happiness, 
expire  unenvied  and  unrivalled.  But  when  the  tumult  of 
war  shall  cease,  and  the  tempest  of  present  passions  be  suc- 
ceeded by  calm  reflection,  or  when  those,  who,  surviving 
its  fury,  shall  inherit  from  you  a  legacy  of  debts  and 


112  THE   CRISIS. 

fortunes,  when  the  j  >arly  revenue  shall  scarcely  be  able  tc 
discharge  the  intere&t  of  the  one,  and  no  possible  remedy 
be  left  for  the  other,  ideas,  far  different  from  the  present, 
will  arise,  and  imbitter  the  remembrance  of  former  follies. 
A  mind  disarmed  of  its  rage,  feels  no  pleasure  in  contem- 
plating a  frantic  quarrel.  Sickness  of  thought,  the  sure  con- 
sequence of  conduct  like  yours,  leaves  no  ability  for  enjoy- 
ment, no  relish  for  resentment ;  and  though,  like  a  man  in  a 
fit,  you  feel  not  the  injury  of  the  struggle,  nor  distinguish 
between  strength  and  disease,  the  weakness  will  neverthe- 
less be  proportioned  to  the  violence,  and  the  sense  of  pain 
increase  with  the  recovery. 

To  what  persons  or  to  whose  system  of  politics  you  owe 
your  present  state  of  wretchedness,  is  a  matter  of  total  in- 
difference to  America.  They  have  contributed,  however, 
unwillingly,  to  set  her  above  themselves,  and  she,  in  the 
tranquillity  of  conquest,  resigns  the  inquiry.  The  case  now 
is  not  so  properly  who  began  the  war,  as  who  continues  it. 
That  there  are  men  in  all  countries  to  whom  a  Itate  of  war 
is  a  mine  of  wealth,  is  a  fact  never  to  be  doubted.  Char- 
acters like  these  naturally  breed  in  the  putrefaction  of  dis- 
tempered times,  and  after  fattening  on  the  disease,  they 
perish  with  it,  or,  impregnated  with  the  stench,  retreat  into 
obscurity. 

But  there  are  several  erroneous  notions  to  which  you  like- 
wise owe  a  share  of  your  misfortunes,  and  which,  if  con- 
tinued, will  only  increase  your  trouble  and  your  losses.  An 
opinion  hangs  about  the  gentlemen  of  the  minority,  that 
America  would  relish  measures  under  their  administration, 
which  she  would  not  from  the  present  cabinet.  On  this 
rock  lord  Chatham  would  have  split  had  he  gained  the  helm, 
and  several  of  his  survivors  are  steering  the  same  course. 
Such  distinctions  in  the  infancy  of  the  argument  had  some 
degree  of  foundation,  but  they  now  serve  no  other  purpose 
than  to  lengthen  out  a  war,  in  which  the  limits  of  a  dispute 
being  fixed  by  the  fate  of  arms,  and  guaranteed  by  trea- 
ties, are  not  to  be  changed  or  altered  by  trivial  circum- 
stances. 

The  ministry,  and  many  of  the  minority,  sacrifice  their 
time  in  disputing  on  a  question  with  whicii  they  have  no- 
thing to  do,  namely,  whether  America  shall  be  independent 
or  not  ?  Whereas  the  only  question  that  can  come  under 
their  determination  is,  whether  they  will  accede  to  it  or  not  ? 
They  confound  a  military  question  with  a  political  one,  and 


THE   CRISIS.  113 

undertake  to  supply  by  a  vote  what  they  lost  bv  a  battle. 
Say,  she  shall  not  be  independent,  and  it  will  signify  as  much 
as  if  they  voted  against  a  decree  of  fate,  or  say  that  she  shall, 
and  she  will  be  no  more  independent  than  before.  Ques- 
tions, which  when  determined,  cannot  be  executed,  serve 
only  to  show  the  folly  of  dispute  and  the  weakness  of  dia- 
putanta 

From  a  long  habit  of  calling  America  your  own,  you 
suppose  her  governed  by  the  same  prejudices  and  conceits 
which  govern  yourselves.  Because  you  have  set  up  a  par- 
ticular denomination  of  religion  to  the  exclusion  of  all  others, 
you  imagine  she  must  do  the  same,  and  because  you,  with 
an  unsociable  narrowness  of  mind,  have  cherished  enmity 
against  France  and  Spain,  you  suppose  her  alliance  must  be 
defective  in  friendship.  Copying  her  notions  of  the  world 
from  you,  she  formerly  thought  as  you  instructed,  but  now 
feeling  herself  free,  and  the  prejudice  removed,  she  thinks 
and  acts  upon  a  different  system.  It  frequently  happens 
that  in  proportion  as  we  are  taught  to  dislike  persons  and 
countries,  not  knowing  why,  we  feel  an  ardor  of  esteem  upon 
the  removal  of  the  mistake :  it  seems  as  if  something  was  to 
be  made  amends  for,  and  we  eagerly  give  into  every  office 
of  friendship,  to  atone  for  the  injury  of  the  error. 

But,  perhaps,  there  is  something  in  the  extent  of  countries, 
which,  among  the  generality  of  people,  insensibly  communi- 
cates extension  of  the  mind.  The  soul  of  an  islander,  in  its 
native  state,  seems  bounded  by  the  foggy  confines  of  the 
water's  edge,  and  all  beyond  affords  to  him  matters  only  for 
profit  or  curiosity,  not  for  friendship.  His  island  is  to  him 
his  world,  and  fixed  to  that,  his  every  thing  centres  in  it ; 
vhile  those,  who  are  inhabitants  of  a  continent,  by  casting 
taeir  eye  over  a  larger  field,  take  in  likewise  a  larger  intel- 
lectual circuit,  and  thus  approaching  nearer  to  an  acquaint- 
ance with  the  universe,  their  atmosphere  of  thought  i» 
extended,  and  their  liberality  fills  a  wider  space.  In  short, 
oui'  minds  seem  to  be  measured  by  countries  when  we  are 
men,  as  they  are  by  places  when  we  are  children,  and  until 
something  happens  to  disentangle  us  from  the  prejudice,  we 
serve  under  it  without  perceiving  it. 

In  addition  to  this,  it  may  be  remarked,  that  men  who 
study  anv  universal  science,  the  principles  of  which  are 
universally  known,  or  admitted,  and  applied  without  dis- 
tinction to  the  common  benefit  of  all  countries,  obtain  there- 
by a  larger  share  of  philanthropy  than  those  who  only  study 


114  THE   CRISIS. 

national  arts  and  improvements.  Natural  philosophy, 
mathematics  and  astronomy,  carry  the  mind  from  the  countrv 
to  the  creation,  and  give  it  a  fitness  suited  to  the  extent,  fib 
was  not  Newton's  honor,  neither  could  it  be  his  pride,  that 
he  was  an  Englishman,  but  that  he  was  a  philosopher ;  the 
heavens  had  liberated  him  from  the  prejudices  of  an  island, 
and  science  had  expanded  his  soul  as  boundless  as  hit/ 
studies. 

COMMON  SENSE. 

Philadelphia,  Jtarch,  1780. 


NUMBER  IX. 

HAT>  America  pursued  her  advantages  with  half  the  spirit 
that  she  resisted  her  misfortunes,  she  would,  before  now, 
have  been  a  conquering  and  a  peaceful  people ;  but  lulled 
in  the  lap  of  soft  tranquillity,  she  rested  on  her  hopes,  and 
adversity  only  has  convulsed  her  into  action.  Whether  sub- 
tlety or  sincerity  at  the  close  of  the  last  year,  induced  the 
enemy  to  an  appearance  for  peace,  is  a  point  not  material 
to  know :  it  is  sufficient  that  we  see  the  effects  it  has  had  on 
our  politics,  and  that  we  sternly  rise  to  resent  the  delusion. 

The  war,  on  the  part  of  America,  has  been  a  war  of  na- 
tural feelings.  Brave  in  distress ;  serene  in  conquest ;  drowsy 
while  at  rest ;  and  in  every  situation  generously  disposed  to 
peace.  A  dangerous  calm,  and  a  most  heightened  zeal, 
have,  as  circumstances  varied,  succeeded  each  other.  Every 
passion,  but  that  of  despair,  has  been  called  to  a  tour  of 
duty  ;  and  so  mistaken  has  been  the  enemy,  of  our  abilities 
and  disposition,  that  when  she  supposed  us  conquered,  we 
rose  the  conquerors.  The  extensiveness  of  the  United  States, 
and  the  variety  of  their  resources ;  the  universality  of  their 
cause,  the  quick  operation  of  their  feelings,  and  the  similar- 
ity of  their  sentiments,  have,  in  every  trying  situation,  pro- 
duced a  something,  which,  favored  by  providence,  and  pur- 
sued with  ardor,  has  accomplished  in  an  instant  the  business 
of  a  campaign.  We  have  never  deliberately  sought  victory, 
but  snatcned  it :  and  bravely  undone  in  an  hour,  the  blotted 
operations  of  a  season. 

The  reported  fate  of  Charleston,  like  the  misfortune*  of 


•  THE    CRI8I8.  ]  15 

1776,  has  at  last  called  forth  a  spirit,  and  kindled  up  a 
flame,  which  perhaps  no  other  event  could  have  produced. 
If  the  enemy  has  circulated  a  falsehood,  they  have  unwisely 
aggravated  us  into  life,  and  if  they  have  told  us  a  truth, 
they  have  unintentionally  done  us  a  service.  "We  were  re- 
turning with  folded  arms  from  the  fatigues  of  war,  and  think- 
ing and  sitting  leisurely  down  to  enjoy  repose.  The  depend- 
ence that  has  been  put  upon  Charleston  threw  a  drowsiness 
over  America.  We  looked  on  the  business  done — the  conflict 
over — the  matter  settled — or  that  all  which  remained  unfin- 
ished would  follow  of  itself.  In  this  state  of  dangerous  re- 
laxation, exposed  to  the  poisonous  infusions  of  the  enemy, 
and  having  no  common  danger  to  attract  our  attention,  we 
were  extinguishing,  by  stages,  the  ardor  we  began  with,  and 
surrendering  by  piece-meals  the  virtue  that  defended  us. 

Ainicting  as  the  loss  of  Charleston  may  be,  yet  if  it  uni 
versally  rouse  us  from  the  slumber  of  twelve  months  past, 
and  renew  in  us  the  spirit  of  former  days,  it  will  produce  an 
advantage  more  important  than  its  loss.  America  ever  is 
what  she  thinks  herself  to  be.  Governed  by  sentiment,  and 
acting  her  own  mind,  she  becomes,  as  she  pleases  the  victor 
or  the  victim. 

It  is  not  the  conquest  of  towns,  nor  the  accidental  capture 
of  garrisons,  that  can  reduce  a  country  so  extensive  as  this. 
The  sufferings  of  one  part  can  never  be  relieved  by  the  ex- 
ertions of  another,  and  there  is  no  situation  the  enemy  can 
be  placed  in,  that  does  not  afford  to  us  the  same  advantages 
he  seeks  himself. .  By  dividing  his  force,  he  leaves  every 
post  attackable.  It  is  a  mode  of  war  that  carries  with  it  a 
confession  of  weakness,  and  goes  on  the  principle  of  4istre&s, 
rather  than  conquest. 

The  decline  of  the  enemy  is  visible,  not  only  in  their  ope 
rations,  but  in  their  plans ;  Charleston  originally  made  but 
a  secondary  object  in  the  system  of  attack,  and  it  is  now  be- 
come the  principal  one,  because  they  have  not  been  able  to 
succeed  elsewhere.  It  would  have  carried  a  cowardly  ap 
pearance  in  Europe  had  they  formed  their  grand  expedition, 
in  1776,  against  a  part  of  tne  continent  where  there  was  no 
army,  or  not  a  sufficient  one  to  oppose  them ;  but  failing 
year  after  year  in  their  impressions  here,  and  to  the  eastward 
ind  northward,  they  deserted  their  capital  design,  and  pru- 
dently contenting  themselves  with  what  they  could  get,  give 
a  flourish  of  honor  to  conceal  disgrace. 

But  this  piece-meal  work  is  not  conquering  the  continent 


116  THE  OBI8I8.  . 

It  is  a  discredit  in  them  to  attempt  it,  and  in  us  to  suffer  it. 
It  is  now  full  time  to  put  an  end  to  a  v? ar  of  aggravations, 
which,  on  one  side,  has  no  possible  object,  and  on  the  other, 
has  every  inducement  whicn  honor,  interest,  safety  and  hap- 
piness can  inspire.  If  we  suffer  them  much  longer  to  re- 
main among  us,  we  shall  become  as  bad  as  themselves.  An 
association  of  vice  will  reduce  us  more  than  the  aword.  A 
nation  hardened  in  the  practice  of  iniquity  knows  better  how 
to  profit  by  it,  than  a  young  country  newly  corrupted.  We 
are  not  a  match  for  them  in  the  line  of  advantageous  guilt, 
nor  they  for  us  on  the  principles  which  we  bravely  set  out 
with.  Our  first  days  were  our  days  of  honor.  They  have 
marked  the  character  of  America  wherever  the  story  of  her 
wars  are  told :  and  convinced  of  this,  we  have  nothing  to 
do,  but  wisely  and  unitedly  tread  the  well  known  track. 
The  progress  of  a  war  is  often  as  ruinous  to  individuals,  as 
the  issue  of  it  is  to  a  nation  ;  and  it  is  not  only  necessary  that 
our  forces  be  such  that  we  be  conquerors  in  the  end,  but 
that  by  timely  exertions  we  be  secure  in  the  interim.  The 
present  campaign  will  afford  an  opportunity  which  has 
never  presented  itself  before,  and  the  preparations  for  it  are 
equally  necessary,  whether  Charleston  stand  or  fall.  Sup- 
pose the  first,  it  is  in  that  case  only  a  failure  of  the  enemy, 
not  a  defeat.  All  the  conquest  that  a  besieged  town  can 
hope  for,  is,  not  to  be  conquered ;  and  compelling  an  enemy 
to  raise  the  siege,  is  to  the  besieged  a  victory.  But  there 
must  be  a  probability  amounting  almost  to  certainty,  that 
would  justify  a  garrison  marching  out  to  attack  a  retreat. 
Therefore  should  Charleston  not  be  taken,  and  the  enemy 
abandon  the  siege,  every  other  part  of  the  continent  should 
prepare  to  meet  them ;  and,  on  the  contrary,  should  it  be 
taken,  the  same  preparations  are  necessary  to  balance  the 
loss,  and  put  ourselves  in  a  condition  to  co-operate  with  our 
allies,  immediately  on  their  arrival. 

"We  are  not  now  fighting  our  battles  alone,  as  we  were  in 
1776  ;  England,  from  a  malicious  disposition  to  America, 
has  not  only  not  declared  war  against  France  and  Spain, 
but  the  better  to  prosecute  her  passions  here,  has  afforded 
those  powers  no  military  object,  and  avoids  them,  to  distress 
us.  She  will  suffer  her  West  India  islands  to  be  overrun  by 
France,  and  her  southern  settlements  to  be  taken  by  Spain, 
rather  than  quit  the  object  that  gratifies  her  revenge.  This 
conduct,  on  me  part  of  Britain,  has  pointed  out  the  propriety 
')f  France  sending  a  naT'al  arid  land  force  to  co-operate  wito 


THE  CRISIS.  117 

America  on  the  spot.  Their  arrival  cannot  be  very  distant, 
nor  the  ravages  of  the  enemy  long.  The  recruiting  the  army, 
and  procuring  the  supplies,  are  the  two  things  most  necessary 
to  be  accomplished,  and  a  capture  of  either  of  the  enemy  s 
divisions  will  restore  to  America  peace  and  plenty. 

At  a  crisis,  big,  like  the  present,  with  expectation  and 
events,  the  whole  country  is  called  to  unanimity  and  exer- 
tion. Not  an  ability  ought  now  to  sleep,  that  can  produce 
but  a  mite  to  the  general  good,  nor  even  a  whisper  to  pass 
that  militates  against  it.  The  necessity  of  the  case,  and  the 
importance  of  the  consequences,  admit  no  delay  from  a  friend, 
no  apology  from  an  enemy.  To  spare  now,  would  be  the 
height  of  extravagance,  and  to  consult  present  ease,  would 
be  to  sacrifice  it  perhaps  forever. 

America,  rich  in  patriotism  and  produce,  can  want  neither 
men  nor  supplies,  when  a  serious  necessity  calls  them  forth. 
The  slow  operation  of  taxes,  owing  to  the  extensiveness  of 
collection,  and  their  depreciated  value  before  they  arrived  in 
the  treasury,  have,  in  many  instances,  thrown  a  burden  upon 
government,  which  has  been  artfully  interpreted  by  the 
enemy  into  a  general  decline  throughout  the  country.  Yet 
this,  inconvenient  as  it  may  at  first  appear,  is  not  only 
remediable,  but  may  be  turned  to  an  immediate  advantage  ; 
for  it  makes  no  real  difference,  whether  a  certain  number  of 
men,  or  company  of  militia  (and  in  this  country  every  man 
is  a  militia-man)  are  directed  by  law  to  send  a  recruit  at 
their  own  expense,  or  whether  a  tax  is  laid  on  them  for  that 
purpose,  and  the  man  hired  by  government  afterwards.  The 
nrstxif  there  is  any  difference,  is  both  cheapest  and  best, 
because  it  saves  the  expense  which  would  attend  collecting 
it  as  a  tax,  and  brings  the  man  sooner  into  the  field  than  the 
modes  of  recruiting  formerly  used ;  and,  on  this  principle,  a 
law  has  been  passed  in  this  state,  for  recruiting  two  men 
from  each  company  of  militia,  which  will  add  upwards  of  a 
thousand  to  the  force  of  the  country. 

But  the  flame  which  has  broke  forth  in  this  city  since  the 
report  from  New  York,  of  the  loss  of  Charleston,  not  only 
does  honor  to  the  plac«,  but,  like  the  blaze  of  1776,  will 
kindle  into  action  the  scattered  sparks  throughout  America. 
The  valor  of  a  country  may  be  learned  by  the  bravery  of  its 
soldiery,  and  the  general  cast  of  its  inhabitants,  but  confi- 
dence of  success  is  best  discovered  by  the  active  measures 
pursued  by  men  of  property ;  and  when  the  spirit  of  inter- 
prise  becomes  so  universal  as  to  act  at  om-e  on  all  ranks  of 


118  THE   CRISIS. 

men.  a  war  may  then,  and  not  till  then,  be  styled  truly 
popular. 

In  1776,  the  ardor  of  the  enterprising  part  was  considera- 
bly checked  by  the  real  revolt  of  some,  and  the  coolness  ol 
others.  But  in  the  present  case,  there  is  a  firmness  in  the 
substance  and  property  of  the  country  to  the  public  cause. 
An  association  has  been  entered  into  by  the  merchants, 
tradesmen,  and  principal  inhabitants  of  the  city,  to  receive 
and  support  the  new  state  money  at  the  value  of  gold  and 
silver ;  a  measure  which,  while  it  does  them  honor,  will 
likewise  contribute  to  their  interest,  by  rendering  the  opera- 
tions of  the  campaign  convenient  and  effectual. 

Nor  has  the  spirit  of  exertion  stopped  here.  A  voluntary 
subscription  is  likewise  begun,  to  raise  a  fund  of  hard  money, 
to  be  given  as  bounties,  to  fill  up  the  full  quota  of  the 
Pennsylvania  line.  It  has  been  the  remark  01  the  enemy, 
that  every  thing  in  America  has  been  done  by  the  force  of 
government;  but  when  she  sees  individuals  throwing  in 
their  voluntary  aid,  and  facilitating  the  public  measures  in 
concert  with  the  established  powers  of  the  country,  it  will 
convince  her  that  the  cause  of  America  stands  not  on  the 
will  of  a  few,  but  on  the  broad  foundation  of  property  and 
popularity. 

Thus  aided  and  thus  supported,  disaffection  will  decline, 
and  the  withered  head  of  tyranny  expire  in  America.  The 
ravages  of  the  enemy  will  be  short  and  limited,  and  like  all 
their  former  ones,  will  produce  a  victory  over  themselves. 

COMMON  SENSE. 

Philadelphia,  June  9,  1780.  • 

ISgr'  At  the  time  of  writing  this  number  of  the  Crisis, 
the  loss  of  Charleston,  though  believed  by  some,  was  more 
confidently  disbelieved  by  others.  But  there  ought  to  be 
no  longer  a  doubt  upon  the  matter.  Charleston  is  gone, 
and  I  believe  for  the  want  of  a  sufficient  supply  of  provisions. . 
The  man  that  does  not  now  feel  for  the  honor  of  the  bert  and 
noblest  cause  that  ever  a  country  engaged  in,  and  exert 
himself  accordingly,  is  no  longer  worthy  of  a  peaceable 
residence  among  a  people  determined  to  be  free.  0  S. 


THE   CRISIS.  119 

NUMBEK  X. 
ON  THE  SUBJECT  OF  TAXATION. 

IT  is  impossible  to  sit  down  and  think  seriously  on  the 
affairs  of  America,  but  the  original  principles  on  which  she 
resisted,  and  the  glow  and  ardor  which  they  inspired,  will 
occur  like  the  undefaced  remembrance  of  a  lovely  scene.  Tt 
trace  over  in  imagination  the  purity  of  the  cause,  the  volun 
tary  sacrifices  that  were  made  to  support  it,  and  all  th* 
various  turnings  of  the  war  in  its  defence,  is  at  once  both 
paying  and  receiving  respect.  The  principles  deserve  to  be 
remembered,  and  to  remember  them  rightly  is  repossessing 
them.  In  this  indulgence  of  generous  recollection,  we  become 
gainers  by  what  we  seem  to  give,  and  the  more  we  bestow 
tne  richer  we  become. 

So  extensively  right  was  the  ground  on  which  America 
proceeded,  that  it  not  only  took  in  every  just  and  liberal 
sentiment  which  could  impress  the  heart,  but  made  it  the 
direct  interest  of  every  class  and  order  of  men  to  defend  the 
country.  The  war,  on  the  part  of  Britain,  was  originally  a 
war  oi  covetousness.  The  sordid,  and  not  the  splendid 
passions  gave  it  being.  The  fertile  fields  and  prosperous 
infancy  of  America  appeared  to  her  as  mines  for  tributary 
wealth.  She  viewed  the  hive,  and  disregarding  the  industry 
that  had  enriched  it,  thirsted  for  the  noney.  But  in  the 
present  stage  of  her  affairs,  the  violence  of  temper  is  added 
to  the  rage  of  avarice  ;  and  therefore,  that  which  at  the  first 
aetting  out  proceeded  from  purity  of  principle  and  public 
interest,  is  now  heightened  by  all  the  obligations  of  necessity ; 
for  it  requires  but  little  knowledge  of  human  nature  to  dis- 
cern what  would  be  the  consequences,  were  America  again 
reduced  to  the  subjection  of  Britain.  Uncontrolled  power, 
in  the  hands  of  an  incensed,  imperious,  and  rapacious  con- 
queror, is  an  engine  of  dreadful  execution,  and  wo  be  to 
that  country  over  which  it  can  be  exercised.  The  names  of 
whig  and  tory  would  then  be  sunk  in  the  general  term  of 
rebel,  and  the  oppression,  whatever  it  might  be,  would,  with 
very  few  instances  of  exception,  light  equally  on  all. 

Britain  did  not  go  to  war  with  America  for  the  sake  of 
dominion,  because  she  was  then  in  possession ;  neither  was 
it  for  the  extension  of  trade  and  commerce,  because  she  had 


L-20  THE   CEISIS. 

monopolized  the  whole,  and  the  country  had  yielded  to  it  j 
neither  was  it  to  extinguish  what  she  might  call  rebellion, 
because  before  she  began  no  resistance  existed.  It  could 
then  be  from  no  other  motive  than  avarice,  or  a  design  of 
establishing,  in  the  first  instance,  the  same  taxes  in  America 
as  are  paid  in  England  (which,  as  I  shall  presently  show,  are 
above  eleven  times  heavier  than  the  taxes  we  now  pay  for 
the  present  year,  1T80)  or,  in  the  second  instance,  to  confis- 
cate the  whole  property  of  America,  in  case  of  resistance 
and  conquest  of  the  latter,  of  which  she  had  then  no  doubt. 

I  shall  now  proceed  to  show  what  the  taxes  in  England 
are,  and  what  the  yearly  expense  of  the  present  war  is  to 
her — what  the  taxes  of  this  country  amount  to,  and  what 
the  annual  expense  of  defending  it  effectually  will  be  to  us ; 
and  shall  endeavor  concisely  to  point  out  the  cause  of  our 
difficulties,  and  the  advantages  on  one  side,  and  the  conse- 
quences on  the  other,  in  case  we  do,  or  do  not,  put  ourselves 
in  an  effectual  state  of  defence.  I  mean  to  be  open,  candid, 
and  sincere.  I  see  a  universal  wish  to  expel  the  enemy  from 
the  country,  a  murmuring  because  the  war  is  not  carried  on 
with  more  vigor,  and  my  intention  is  to  show,  as  shortly  as 
possible,  both  the  reason  and  the  remedy. 

The  number  of  souls  in  England  (exclusive  of  Scotland 
and  Ireland)  is  seven  millions,*  and  the  number  of  souls  in 
America  is  three  millions. 

The  amount  of  taxes  in  England  (exclusive  of  Scotland 
and  Ireland)  was,  before  the  present  war  commenced,  eleven 
millions  six  hundred  and  forty-two  thousand  six  hundred 
and  fifty-three  pounds  sterling ;  which,  on  an  average,  is  no 
less  a  sum  than  one  pound  thirteen  shillings  and  three-pence 
sterling  per  head  per  annum,  men,  women  and  children  \ 
besides  county  taxes,  for  the  support  of  the  poor,  and 
a  tenth  of  all  the  produce  of  the  earth  for  the  support  of 
the  bishops  and  clergy.  Nearly  five  millions  of  this  sum 
went  annually  to  pay  the  interest  of  the  national  debt,  con- 
tracted by  former  wars,  and  the  remaining  sum  of  six  mil- 
lions six  hundred  and  forty-two  thousand  six  hundred  pounds 
was  applied  to  defray  the  yearly  expense  of  government, 
the  peace  establishment  of  the  army  and  navy,  placemen, 
pensioners,  &c.,  consequently,  the  whole  of  the  enormous 
taxee  being  thus  appropriated,  she  had  nothing  to  spare  out 
of  them  towards  defraying  the  expenses  of  the  present  war 

*  This  is  taking  the  highest  number  that  th*>  people  of  England  hare 
or  can  be  rated  at.      • 


121 

or  any  other.*  Yet  had  she  not  been  in  debt  at  the  begin- 
ning of  the  war,  as  we  were  not,  and,  like  ns,  had  only  a 
land  and  not  a  naval  war  to  carry  on,  her  then  revenue  of 
eleven  millions  and  a  half  pounds  sterling  would  have 
defrayed  all  her  annual  expenses  of  war  and  government 
within  each  year. 

But  this  not  being  the  case  with  her,  she  is  obliged  to 
borrow  about  ten  millions  pounds  sterling,  yearly,  to  prose- 
cute the  war  that  she  is  now  engaged  in,  (this  year  she  bor- 
rowed twelve)  and  lay  on  new  taxes  to  discharge  the  interest ; 
allowing  that  the  present  war  has  cost  her  only  fifty  millions 
sterling,  the  interest  thereon,  at  five  per  cent.;  will  be  two 
millions  and  an  half;  therefore  the  amount  of  her  taxes  now 
must  be  fourteen  millions,  which  on  an  average  is  no  less  than 
forty  shillings  sterling,  per  head  men,  women  and  children, 
throughout  the  nation.  Now  as  this  expense  of  fifty  mil- 
lions was  borrowed  on  the  hopes  of  conquering  America, 
and  as  it  was  avarice  which  first  induced  ner  to  commence 
the  war,  how  truly  wretched  and  deplorable  would  the  con- 
dition of  this  country  be,  were  she,  by  her  own  remissness, 
to  suffer  an  enemy  of  such  a  disposition,  and  so  circum- 
stanced, to  reduce  her  to  subjection. 

I  now  proceed  to  the  revenues  of  America. 

*  The  following  is  taken  from  Dr.  Price's  state  of  the  taxes  of  England, 
p.  96,  97,  98. 

An  account  of  the  money  drawn  from  the  public  by  taxes,  annually,  being 
the  medium  of  three  years  before  the  year  1*776. 

Amount  of  customs  in  England. 2,528,2757. 

Amount  of  the  excise  in  England 4,649,892 

Land  tax  at  8* 1,800,000 

Land  tax  at  Is.  in  the  pound 450,000 

Salt  duties 218,789 

Duties  on  stamps,  cards,  dice,  advertisements,  bonds,  leases, 

indentures,  newspapers,  almanacks,  &c. .    280,788 

Duties  on  houses  and  windows 885,369 

Post  office,  seizures,  wine  licences,  hackney  coaches,  Ac.. .    260,000 

Annual  profits  from  lotteries 150,000 

Expense  of  collecting  the  excise  in  England 297,887 

Expense  of  collecting  the  customs  in  England 468,700 

Interest  of  loans  on  the  land  tax  at  4s.  expenses  of  collec- 
tion, militia,  &c 260,000 

Perquisites,  &c  to  custom-house  officers,  &c.  supposed. ..    250,000 
Expense  of  collecting  the  salt  duties  in  England  10  1-2  per 

cent 27,000 

Bounties,  on  fish  exported 18,000 

Expense  of  collecting  the  duties  on  stamps,  cards,  adver- 
tisements, &c.  at  5  and  1-4  per  cent 18,000 

Total,  ll,642,fl53J. 


122  THE   CRISIS. 

I  have  already  stated  the  number  of  souls  in  America  to- 
be  three  millions,  and  by  a  calculation  that  I  have  made, 
which  I  have  every  reason  to  believe  is  sufficiently  correct, 
the  whole  expense  of  the  war,  and  the  support  of  the  seve- 
ral governments,  may^  be  defrayed  by  two  million  pounds 
sterling  annually ;  which,  on  an  average,  is  thirteen  shillings 
and  four  pence  per  head,  men,  women,  and  children,  and  the 
peace  establishment  at  the  end  of  the  war,  will  be  but  three 
quarters  of  a  million,  or  five  shillings  sterling  per  head. 
Kow,  throwing  out  of  the  question  every  thing  of  honor, 
principle,  happiness,  freedom  and  reputation  in  the  world, 
and  taking  it  up  on  the  simple  ground  of  interest,  I  put  the 
following  case : 

Suppose  Britain  was  to  conquer  America,  and,  as  a  con- 
queror, was  to  lay  her  under  no  other  conditions  than  to  pay 
the  same  proportion  towards  her  annual  revenue  which  the 
people  of  England  pay  ;  our  share,  in  that  case,  would  be 
six  million  pounds  sterling  yearly ;  can  it  then  be  a  question, 
whether  it  is  best  to  raise  two  millions  to  defend  the  coun- 
try, and  govern  it  ourselves,  and  only  three  quarters  of  a 
million  afterwards,  or  pay  six  millions  to  have  it  conquered, 
and  let  the  enemy  govern  it  ? 

Can  it  be  supposed  that  conquerors  would  choose  to  put 
themselves  in  a  worse  condition  than  what  they  granted  to 
the  conquered  ?  In  England,  the  tax  on  rum  is  five  shil- 
lings and  one  penny  sterling  per  gallon,  which  is  one  silver 
dollar  and  fourteen  coppers.  Now  would  it  not  be  laugha- 
ble to  imagine,  that  after  the  expense  they  have  been  at, 
they  would  let  either  whig  or  tory  drink  it  cheaper  than 
themselves  ?  Coffee,  which  is  so  inconsiderable  an  article 
of  consumption  and  support  here,  is  there  loaded  with  a 
duty,  which  makes  the  price  between  five  and  six  shillings 
per  pound,  and  a  penalty  of  fifty  pounds  sterling  on  any 
person  detected  in  roasting  it  in  his  own  house.  There  is 
scarcely  a  necessary  of  life  that  you  can  eat,  drink,  wear,  or 
enjoy,  that  is  not  there  loaded  with  a  tax ;  even  the  light 
from  heaven  is  only  permitted  to  shine  into  their  dwellings 
by  paying  eighteen  pence  sterling  per  window  annually ; 
and  the  humblest  drink  of  life,  small  beer,  cannot  there  be 
purchased  without  a  tax  of  nearly  two  coppers  per  gallon, 
besides  a  heavy  tax  upon  the  malt,  and  another  on  the  hops 
before  it  is  brewed,  exclusive  of  a  land-tax  on  the  earth 
which  produces  them.  In  -short,  the  condition  of  that  coun- 
try, in  point  of  taxation,  is  so  oppressive,  the  number  of  her 


THE   CRISIS.  123 

poor  so  great,  and  the  extravagance  and  rapaciousness  of 
the  court  BO  enormous,  that,  were  they  to  effect  a  conquest 
of  America,  it  is  then  only  that  the  distresses  of  America 
would  begin.  Neither  would  it  signify  any  thing  to  a  man 
whether  he  be  whig  or  tory.  The  people  of  England,  and 
the  ministry  of  that  country,  know  us  by  no  such  distinc- 
tions. What  they  want  is  clear,  solid  revenue,  and  the 
modes  which  they  would  take  to  procure  it  would  operate 
alike  on  all.  Their  manner  of  reasoning  would  be  short, 
because  they  would  naturally  infer,  that  if  we  were  able  to 
carry  on  a  war  of  five  or  six  years  against  them,  we  were 
able  to  pay  the  same  taxes  which  they  do. 

I  have  already  stated  that  the  expense  of  conducting  the 
present  war,  and  the  government  01  the  several  states,  may 
be  done  for  two  millions  sterling,  and  the  establishment  in 
the  time  of  peace,  for  three  quarters  of  a  million.* 

As  to  navy  matters,  they  nourish  so  well,  and  are  so  well 
attended  to  by  individuals,  that  I  think  it  consistent  on 
every  principle  of  real  use  and  economy,  to  turn  the  navy 
into  hard  money  (keeping  only  three  or  four  packets)  and 
apply  it  to  the  service  of  the  army.  We  shall  not  have  a 
ship  the  less ;  the  use  of  them,  and  the  benefit  from  them, 
will  be  greatly  increased,  and  their  expense  saved.  We  are 
now  allied  with  a  formidable  naval  power,  from  whom  we 
derive  the  assistance  of  a  navy.  And  the  line  in  which  we 
can  prosecute  the  war,  so  as  to  reduce  the  common  enemv 
and  benefit  the  alliance  most  effectually,  will  be  by  attend- 
ing closely  to  the  land  service. 

I  estimate  the  charge  of  keeping  up  and  maintaining  an 
army,  officering  them,  and  all  expenses  included,  sufficient 
for  the  defence  of  the  country,  to  oe  equal  to  the  expense  of 
forty  thousand  men  at  thirty  pounds  sterling  per  head,  which 
is  one  million  two  hundred  thousand  pounds. 

I  likewise  allow  four  hundred  thousand  pounds  for  conti- 
nental expenses  at  home  and  abroad. 

And  four  hundred  thousand  pounds  for  the  support  of  the 
several  state  governments — the  amount  will  then  oe, 

Forthearmy 1,200,OOOJ. 

Continental  expenses  at  home  and  abroad 400,000 

Government  of  the  several  states 400,000 

Total  2,000,000*. 

*  I  have  made  the  calculations  In  sterling,  because  it  is  a  rate  generally 
known  in  all  the  states,  and  because,  likewise,  it  admits  of  an  easy  comparison 
between  our  expense  to  support  the  war,  and  those  of  the  enemy.  Four  silver 
dollar?  and  a  half  is  one  pound  b'.erluur  md  three  pence  over. 


124  THE   OKI8I8. 

I  take  the  proportion  of  this  state,  Pennsylvania,  to  be  an 
eighth  part  of  the  thirteen  United  States ;  the  quota  then 
for  us  to  raise  will  be  two  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  pounds 
.sterling  ;  two  hundred  thousand  of  which  will  be  our  share 
for  the  support  and  pay  of  the  army,  and  continental  ex- 
penses at  home  and  abroad,  and  fifty  thousand  pounds  foi 
the  support  of  the  state  government. 

In  order  to  gain  an  idea  of  the  proportion  in  which  the 
raising  such  a  sum  will  fall,  I  make  the  following  cal- 
culation. 

Pennsylvania  contains  three  hundred  and  seventy-five 
thousand  inhabitants,  men,  women  and  children ;  which  is 
likewise  an  eighth  of  the  number  of  inhabitants  of  the 
whole  United  States  ;  therefore  two  hundred  and  fifty  thou- 
sand pounds  sterling  to  be  raised  among  three  hundred  and 
seventy-five  thousand  persons,  is,  on  an  average,  thirteeen 
shillings  and  four  pence  per  head,  per  annum,  or  something 
more  than  one  shilling  sterling  per  month.  And  our  pro- 
portion of  three  quarters  of  a  million  for  the  government  of 
the  country,  in  time  of  peace,  will  be  ninety-three  thousand 
seven  hundred  and  fifty  pounds  sterling ;  fifty  thousand  of 
which  will  be  for  the  government  expenses  of  the  state,  and 
forty-three  thousand  seven  hundred  and  fifty  pounds  for  con- 
tinental expenses  at  home  and  abroad. 

The  peace  establishment  then  will,  on  an  average,  be  five 
shillings  sterling  per  head.  Whereas,  was  England  now  to 
stop,  and  the  war  cease,  her  peace  establishment  would  con- 
tinue the  same  as  it  now  is,  viz.  forty  shillings  per  head ; 
therefore  was  our  taxes  necessary  for  carrying  on  the  war, 
as  much  per  head  as  hers  now  is,  and  the  difference  to  be 
only  whether  we  should,  at  the  end  of  the  war,  pay  at  the 
rate  of  five  shillings  per  head,  or  forty  shillings  per  head, 
the  case  needs  no  thinking  of.  But  as  we  can  securely  de- 
fend and  keep  the  country  for  one  third  less  than  what  our 
burden  would  be  if  it  was  conquered,  and  support  the  go- 
vernments afterwards  for  one  eighth  of  what  Britain  would 
levy  on  us,  and  could  I  find  a  miser  whose  heart  never  felt 
the  emotion  of  a  spark  of  principle,  even  that  man,  unin- 
fluenced by  every  love  but  the  love  of  money,  and  capable 
of  no  attachment  but  to  his  interest,  would  and  must,  from 
the  frugality  which  governs  him,  contribute  to  the  defence 
of  the  country,  or  he  ceases  to  be  a  miser  and  becomes  an 
idiot.  But  whefti  we  take  in  with  it  every  thing  that  can 
ornament  mankind ;  when  the  line  of  our  interest  becomes 
the  line  of  our  happiness*  when  all  that  can  cheer  and 


THE   CRISIS.  12$ 

ay  mate  the  heart;  when  a  sense  of  honor,  fame,  character, 
at  home  and  abroad,  are  interwoven  not  only  with  the 
sec  arity  but  the  increase  of  property,  there  exists  not  a  man 
in  America,  unless  he  be  an  hired  emissary,  who  does  not 
see  that  his  good  is  connected  with  keeping  up  a  sufficient 
defence. 

I  do  not  imagine  that  an  instance  can  be  produced  in  the 
woild,  of  a  country  putting  herself  to  such  an  amazing  charge 
to  conquer  and  enslave  another,  as  Britain  has  done.  The 
gum  is  too  great  for  her  to  think  of  with  any  tolerable  degree 
of  temper ;  and  when  we  consider  the  burden  she  sustains, 
as  well  as  the  disposition  she  has  shown,  it  would  be  the 
height  of  folly  in  us  to  suppose  that  she  would  not  reimburse 
herself  by  the  most  rapid  means,  had  she  America  once  more 
within  her  power.  With  such  an  oppression  of  expense, 
what  would  an  empty  conquest  be  to  her!  What  relief 
under  such  circumstances  could  she  derive  from  a  victory 
without  a  prize  ?  It  was  money,  it  was  revenue  she  first 
went  u>  war  for,  and  nothing  but  that  would  satisfy  her.  It 
is  not  the  nature  of  avarice  to  be  satisfied  with  any  thing 
else.  Every  passion  that  acts  upon  mankind  has  a  peculiar 
mode  of  operation.  Many  of  them  are  temporary  and 
fluctuating ;  they  admit  of  cessation  and  variety.  But  ava- 
rice is  a  fixed,  uniform  passion.  It  neither  abates  of  its  vigor 
nor  changes  its  object ;  and  the  reason  why  it  does  pot,  ia 
founded  in  the  nature  of  things,  for  wealth  has  not  a  rival 
where  avarice  is  a  ruling  passion.  One  beauty  mav  excel 
another,  and  extinguish  from  the  mind  of  man  the  pictured 
remembrance  of  a  former  one  :  but  wealth  is  the  phoenix  of 
avarice,  and  therefore  cannot  seek  a  new  object,  because 
there  is  not  another  in  the  world. 

I  now  pass  on  to  show  the  value  of  the  present  taxes,  and 
compare  them  with  the  annual  expense ;  but  this  I  shall 
preface  with  a  few  explanatory  remarks. 

There  are  two  distinct  things  which  make  the  payment 
of  taxes  difficult ;  the  one  is  the  large  and  real  value  of  the 
sum  to  be  paid,  and  the  other  is  the  scarcity  of  the  thing  in 
which  the  payment  is  to  be  made  ;  and  although  these  ap- 
pear  to  be  one  and  the  same,  they  are  in  several  instances 
not  only  different,  but  the  difficulty  springs  from  different 
causes. 

Suppose  a  tax  to  be  laid  equal  to  one  half  of  what  a  man's 
yearly  income  is,  such  a  tax  could  not  be  paid,  because  the 
property  could  not  be  spared  ;  and  on  the  other  hand,  sup- 


126  THE   CRISIS. 

pose  a  very  trifling  tax  was  laid,  to  be  collected  in  pearh, 
such  a  tax  likewise  could  not  be  paid,  because  they  could 
not  be  had.  Now  any  person  may  see  that  these  are  distinct 
cases,  and  the  latter  of  them  is  a  representation  of  our  own. 

That  the  difficulty  cannot  proceed  from  the  former,  that 
is,  from  the  real  value  or  weight  of  the  tax,  is  evident  at  the 
first  view  to  any  person  who  will  consider  it. 

The  amount  of  the  quota  of  taxes  for  this  state,  for  the 
present  year,  1780,  (and  so  in  proportion  for  every  other 
state)  is  twenty  millions  of  dollars,  which,  at  seventy  for  one> 
is  but  sixty-four  thousand  two  hundred  and  eighty  pounds 
three  shillings  sterling,  and  on  an  average,  is  no  more  than 
three  shillings  and  fivepence  sterling  per  head,  per  annum, 
per  man,  woman  and  child,  or  threepence  two-fifths  per  head 
per  month.  Now  here  is  a  clear,  positive  fact,  that  cannot 
be  contradicted,  and  which  proves  that  the  difficulty  cannot 
be  in  the  weight  of  the  tax,  for  in  itself  it  is  a  trifle,  and  far 
from  being  adequate  to  our  quota  of  the  expense  of  the  war. 
The  quit-rents  of  one  penny  sterling  per  acre  on  only  one 
half  oil  the  state,  come  to  upwards  of  fifty  thousand  pounds, 
which  is  almost  as  much  as  all  the  taxes  of  the  present  year, 
and  as  those  quit-rents  made  no  part  of  the  taxes  then  paid, 
and  are  now  discontinued,  the  quantity  of  money  drawn  for 
public  service  this  year,  exclusive  of  the  militia  fines,  which 
I  shall  take  notice  of  in  the  process  of  this  work,  is  less  than 
ivhat  was  paid  and  payable  in  any  year  preceding  the 
revolution,  and  since  the  last  war;  what  I  mean  is,  that 
the  quit-rents  and  taxes  taken  together  came  to  a  larger  sum 
then,  than  the  present  taxes  without  the  quit-rents  do  now. 

My  intention  by  these  arguments  and  calculations  is  to 
place  the  difficulty  to  the  right  cause,  and  show  that  it  does 
not  proceed  from  the  weight  or  worth  of  the  tax,  but  from 
the  scarcity  of  the  medium  in  which  it  is  paid  ;  and  to  illus- 
trate this  point  still  further,  I  shall  now  show,  that  if  the 
tax  of  twenty  millions  of  dollars  was  of  four  times  the  real 
value  it  now  is,  or  nearly  so,  which  would  be  about  two  hun- 
dred and  fifty  thousand  pounds  sterling,  and  would  be  our 
full  quota,  this  sum  would  have  been  raised  with  more  ease, 
and  have  been  less  felt,  than  the  present  sum  of  only  sixty- 
four  thousand  two  hundred  and  eighty  pounds. 

The  convenience  or  inconvenience  of  paying  a  tax  in 
money  arises  from  the  quantity  of  money  that  can  be 
spared  out  of  trade. 

When   the  emissions  stopped,  the  continent  was  left  ID 


THE  CRISIS.  127 

possession  of  two  hundred  millions  of  dollars,  perhaps  as 
equally  dispersed  as  it  was  possible  for  trade  to  do  it.  And 
as  no  more  was  to  be  issued,  the  rise  or  fall  of  prices  could 
neither  increase  nor  diminish  the  quantity.  It  therefore 
remained  the  same  through  all  the  fluctuations  of  trade  and 
exchange. 

Now  nad  the  exchange  stood  at  twenty  for  one,  which 
was  the  rate  congress  calculated  upon  when  they  arranged 
the  quota  of  the  several  states,  the  latter  end  of  last  year, 
trade  would  have  been  carried  on  for  nearly  four  times  less 
money  than  it  is  now,  and  consequently  the  twenty  millions 
would  have  been  spared  with  much  greater  ease,  and  when 
collected  would  have  been  of  almost  four  times  the  value  that 
they  now  are.  And  on  the  other  hand,  was  the  depreciation  to 
be  ninety  or  one  hundred  for  one,  the  quantity  required  for 
trade  would  be  more  than  at  sixty  or  seventy  for  one,  and 
though  the  value  of  them  would  be  less,  the  difficulty  of 
sparing  the  money  out  of  trade  would  be  greater.  And  on 
tnese  facts  and  arguments  I  rest  the  matter,  to  prove  that  it 
is  not  the  want  of  property,  but  the  scarcity  of  the  medium 
by  which  the  proportion  of  property  for  taxation  is  to  be 
measured  out,  that  makes  the  embarrassment  which  we  lie 
under.  There  is  not  money  enough,  and,  what  is  equally  as 
true,  the  people  will  not  let  there  be  money  enough. 

While  I  am  on  the  subject  of  the  currency,  I  shall  offei 
one  remark  which  will  appear  true  to  every  body,  and  caL 
be  accounted  for  by  nobody,  which  is,  that  the  better  th« 
times  were,  the  worse  the  money  grew ;  and  the  worse  the 
times  were,  the  better  the  money  stood.  It  never  depreciated 
by  any  advantage  obtained  by  the  enemy.  The  troubles  o^ 
1776,  and  the  loss  of  Philadelphia  in  1777,  made  no  sensible 
impression  on  it,  and  every  one  knows  that  the  surrender  of 
Charleston  did  not  produce  the  least  alteration  in  the  rate 
of  exchange,  which,  for  long  before,  and  for  more  than  three 
months  after,  stood  at  sixty  for  one.  It  seems  as  if  the  cer- 
tainty of  its  being  our  own,  made  us  careless  of  its  value, 
and  that  the  most  distant  thoughts  of  losing  it  made  us  hug 
it  the  closer,  like  something  we  were  loth  to  part  with  ;  or 
that  we  depreciate  it  for  our  pastime,  which,  when  called  to 
seriousness  by  the  enemy,  we  leave  off  to  renew  again  at  our 
leisure.  In  snort,  our  good  luck  seems  to  break  us,  and  our 
bad  makes  us  whole. 

Passing  on  from  this  digression,  I  shall  now  endeavor  to 
bring  into  one  view  the  several  parts  which  I  have  already 


128  THE   CRISIS. 

stated,  and  form  thereon,  some  propositions,  and  con- 
clude. 

I  have  placed  before  the  reader,  the  average  tax  per  head, 
paid  by  the  people  of  England :  which  is  forty  shillings 
sterling. 

And  I  have  shown  the  rate  on  an  average  per  head,  which 
will  defray  all  the  expenses  of  the  war  to  ns,  and  support 
the  several  governments  without  running  the  country  into 
debt,  which  is  thirteen  shillings  and  fourpence. 

I  have  shown  what  the  peace  establishment  may  be  con- 
ducted for,  viz.  an  eighth  part  of  what  it  would  be,  if  under 
the  government  of  Britain. 

And  I  have  likewise  shown  what  the  average  per  head  of 
the  present  taxes  are,  namely,  three  shillings  and  fivepence 
sterling,  or  threepence  two-nfths  per  month;  and  that  their 
whole  yearly  value,  in  sterling,  is  only  sixty-four  thousand 
two  hundred  and  eighty  pounds.  Whereas  our  quota,  to 
keep  the  payments  equal  with  the  expenses,  is  two  hundred 
and  fifty  thousand  pounds.  Consequently,  there  is  a  defi- 
ciency of  one  hundred  and  eighty-five  thousand  seven  hun- 
dred and  twenty  pounds,  and  the  same  proportion  of  defect, 
according  to  the  several  quotas,  happens  in  every  othei 
state.  And  this  defect  is  the  cause  why  the  army  has  been 
so  indifferently  fed,  clothed  and  paid.  It  is  the  cause,  like- 
wise, of  the  nerveless  state  of  the  campaign,  and  the  insecu- 
rity of  the  country.  Now,  if  a  tax  equal  to  thirteen  and 
fourpence  per  head,  will  remove  all  these  difficulties,  and 
make  the  people  secure  in  their  homes,  leave  them  to  follow 
the  business  of  their  stores  and  farms  unmolested,  and  not 
only  keep  out,  but  drive  out  the  enemy  from  the  country ; 
and  if  the  neglect  of  raising  this  sum  will  let  them  in,  and 
produce  the  evils  which  might  be  prevented — on  which  side, 
I  ask,  does  the  wisdom,  interest  and  policy  lie  ?  Or,  rather, 
would  it  not  be  an  insult  to  reason,  to  put  the  question  ? 
The  sum  when  proportioned  out  according  to  the  several 
abilities  of  the  people,  can  hurt  no  one,  but  an  inroad  from 
the  enemy  ruins  hundreds  of  families. 

Look  at  the  destruction  done  in  this  city.  The  many 
houses  totally  destroyed,  and  others  damaged  ;  the  waste  of 
fences  in  the  country  around  it,  besides  tha  plunder  of  fur- 
niture, forage,  and  provisions.  I  do  not  suppose  that  half 
a  million  sterling  would  reinstate  the  sufferers;  and  does 
this,  I  ask,  bear  any  proportion  to  the  expBnse  that  would 
make  us  secure.  The  damage,  on  an  average,  is  at  least 


THE   OBI8I8.  18S 

len  pounds  i.terling  per  head,  which  is  as  much  as  thirteen 
shillings  and  four  pence  per  head  comes  to  for  fifteen  years. 
The  same  has  happened  on  the  frontiers,  and  in  the  Jerseys, 
New- York,  and  other  places  where  the  enemy  has  been— 
Carolina  and  Georgia  are  likewise  suffering  the  same  fate. 

That  the  people  generally  do  not  understand  the  insuffi 
eiency  of  the  taxes  to  carry  on  the  war,  is  evident,  not  only 
from  common  observation,  but  from  the  construction  of  sev- 
eral petitions,  which  were  presented  to  the  assembly  of  this 
state  against  the  recommendations  of  congress  of  the  18th 
of  March  last,  for  taking  up  and  funding  the  present  cur- 
rency at  forty  for  one,  and  issuing  new  money  in  its  stead. 
The  prayer  of  the  petition  was,  that  the  currency  might  be 
appreciated  by  taxes  (meaning  the  present  taxes)  and  that 
part  of  the  taxes  be  applied  to  the  support  of  the  army,  if  the 
army  could  not  be  otherwise  supported.  *Now  it  could  not 
have  been  possible  for  such  a  petition  to  have  been  pre- 
sented, had  the  petitioners  known,  that  so  far  from  part  of 
the  taxes  being  sufficient  for  the  support  of  the  army,  the 
whole  of  them  falls  three-fourths  short  of  the  year  s  ex- 
penses. 

Before  I  proceed  to  propose  methods  by  which  a  sufficiency 
of  money  may  be  raised,  I  shall  take  a  short  view  of  the 
general  state  of  the  Country. 

Notwithstanding  the  weight  of  the  war,  the  ravages  of 
the  enemy,  and  the  obstructions  she  has  thrown  in  the  way 
of  trade  and  commerce,  so  soon  does  a  young  country  out- 
grow misfortune,  that  America  has  already  surmounted 
many  that  heavily  oppressed  her.  For  the  first  year  or  two 
of  the  war,  we  were  snut  up  within  our  ports,  scarce  ven- 
turing to  look  towards  the  ocean.  Now  our  rivers  are 
beautified  with  large  and  valuable  vessels,  our  stores  filled 
with  merchandize,  and  the  produce  of  the  country  has  a 
ready  market,  and  an  advantageous  price.  Gold  and  silver, 
chat  for  a  while  seemed  to  have  retreated  again  within  the 
bowels  of  the  earth,  have  once  more  risen  into  circulation, 
and  every  day  adds  new  strength  to  trade,  commerce  and 
agricuUme.  lii  a  pamphlet,  written  by  Sir  John  Dalrymple, 
and  dispersed  in  America  in  the  year  1775,  he  asserted,  that, 
two  tu>6t»i</-(fun  shtps,  nay,  say®  he,  tenders  of  those  ships, 
stationed  oetfioeen  Albemarle  sound  and  Chesapeake  bay, 
would  ghi*t  up  the  trade  of  America  for  600  rrvdes.  How 
little  did  Sii(  t)ouu.  Dalrymple  know  of  the  abilities  of 
A  men* c». 


130  THE   CRISIS. 

While  under  the  government  of  Britain,  the  trade  of  this 
country  was  loaded  with  restrictions.  It  was  only  a  few 
foreign  ports  which  we  were  allowed  to  sail  to.  Now  it  is 
otherwise ;  and  allowing  that  the  quantity  of  trade  is  but 
half  what  it  was  before  the  war,  the  case  must  show  the  vast 
advantage  of  an  open  trade,  because  the  present  quantity 
under  her  restrictions  could  not  support  itself;  from  which. 
I  infer,  that  if  half  the  quantity  without  the  restrictions  can 
bear  itself  up  nearly,  if  not  quite,  as  well  as  the  whole  when 
subject  to  them,  now  prosperous  must  the  condition  of 
America  be  when  the  whole  shall  return  open  with  all  the 
world.  By  the  trade  I  do  not  mean  the  employment  of  a 
merchant  only,  but  the  whole  interest  and  business  of  the 
country  taken  collectively. 

It  is  not  so  much  my  intention,  by  this  publication,  to 
propose  particular  plans  for  raising  money,  as  it  is  to  show 
the  necessity  and  the  advantages  to  be  derived  from  it.  My 
principal  design  is  to  form  the  disposition  of  the  people  to 
the  measures  which  I  am  fully  persuaded  it  is  their  interest 
and  duty  to  adopt,  and  which  needs  no  other  force  to  accom- 
plish them  than  the  force  of  being  felt.  But  as  every  hint  may 
be  useful,  I  shall  throw  out  a  sketch,  and  leave  others  to 
make  such  improvements  upon  it  as  to  them  may  appear 
reasonable. 

The  annual  sum  wanted  is  two  millions,  and  the  average 
rate  in  which  it  falls,  is  thirteen  shillings  and  fourpence  per 
head. 

Suppose,  then,  that  we  raise  half  the  sum  and  sixty  thou- 
sand pounds  over.  The  average  rate  thereof  will  be  seven 
shillings  per  head. 

In  this  case  we  shall  have  half  the  supply  that  we  want, 
and  an  annual  fund  of  sixty  thousand  pounds  whereon  to 
borrow  the  other  million ;  because  sixty  thousand  pounds  is 
the  interest  of  a  million  at  six  per  cent. ;  and  if  at  the  end 
of  another  year  we  should  be  obliged,  by  the  continuance 
of  the  war,  to  borrow  another  million,  the  taxes  will  be 
increased  to  seven  shillings  and  sixpence;  and  thus  for 
every  million  borrowed,  an  additional  tax,  equal  to  sixpence 
per  head,  must  be  levied. 

The  sum  to  be  raised  next  year  will  be  one  million  and 
sixty  thousand  pounds :  one  half  of  which  I  would  propose 
should  be  raised  by  duties  on  imported  goods,  and  prize 
goods,  and  the  other  half  by  a  tax  on  landed  property  and 
nouses,  or  such  other  means  as  each  state  may  devise. 


THE  CRISIS.  131 

But  as  the  duties  oo  imports  and  prize  goods  mast  be  the 
same  in  all  the  states,  therefore  the  rate  per  cent,  or  what 
other  form  the  duty  snail  be  laid,  must  be  ascertained  and 
regulated  by  congress,  and  ingrafted  in  that  form  into  the 
law  of  each  state  ;  and  the  monies  arising  therefrom  carried 
into  the  treasury  of  each  state.  The  duties  to  be  paid  in 
gold  or  siiver. 

There  are  many  reasons  why  a  duty  on  imports  is  the 
most  convenient  duty  or  tax  that  can  be  collected  ;  one  of 
which  is,  because  the  whole  is  payable  in  a  few  places  in  a 
country,  and  it  likewise  operates  with  the  greatest  ease  and 
equality,  because  as  every  one  pays  in  proportion  to  what 
he  consumes,  so  people  in  general  consume  in  proportion  to 
what  they  can  afford,  and  therefore  the  tax  is  regulated  by 
the  abilities  which  every  man  supposes  himself  to  have,  or 
in  other  words,  every  man  becomes  his  own  assessor,  and 
pays  by  a  little  at  a  time,  when  it  suits  him  to  buy. 
Besides  it  is  a  tax  which  people  may  pay  or  let  alone  by  not 
consuming  the  articles ;  and  though  the  alternative  may  have 
no  influence  on  their  conduct,  the  power  of  choosing  is  an 
agreeable  thing  to  the  mind.  For  my  own  part,  it  would 
be  a  satisfaction  to  me,  was  there  a  duty  on  all  sorts  of 
liquors  during  the  war,  as  in  my  idea  of  things  it  would  be 
an  addition  to  the  pleasures  of  society,  to  know,  that  when 
the  health  of  the  army  goes  round,  a  few  drops  from  every 
glass  become  theirs.  How  often  have  I  heard  an  emphati- 
cal  wish,  almost  accompanied  with  a  tear,  "  Oh,  that  our 
poor  fellows  in  the  field  had  some  of  this  /"  Why,  then,  need 
we  suffer  under  a  fruitless  sympathy  when  there  is  a  way 
to  enjoy  both  the  wish  and  the  entertainment  at  once  ? 

But  the  great  national  policy  of  putting  a  duty  upon 
imports  is,  that  it  either  keeps  the  foreign  trade  in  our 
hands,  or  draws  something  for  the  defence  of  the  country 
from  every  foreigner  who  participates  it  with  us. 

Thus  much  for  the  first  half  of  the  taxes,  and  as  each  state 
will  best  devise  means  to  raise  the  other  half,  I  shall  confine 
my  remarks  to  the  resources  of  this  state. 

The  quota,  then,  of  this  state,  of  one  million  and  sixty 
thousand  pounds,  will  be  one  hundred  and  thirty-three  thou- 
sand two  hundred  and  fifty  pounds,  the  half  of  which  is  sixty- 
six  thousand  six  hundred  and  twenty-five  pounds ;  and  sup- 
posing one  fourth  part  of  Pennsylvania  inhabited,  then  a 
tax  or  one  bushel  of  wheat  on  every  twenty  acres  of  land, 
one  with  another,  would  produce  the  sum,  and  all  the  pre- 


132  THE   CRISIS. 

Bent  taxes  to  cease.  Whereas,  the  tithes  of  the  bishops  and 
clergy  in  England,  exclusive  of  the  taxes,  are  upwards  of 
half  a  bushel  of  wheat  on.  every  single  acre  of  land,  good 
and  bad,  throughout  the  nation. 

In  the  former  part  of  this  paper,  I  mentioned  the  militia 
fines,  but  reserved  speaking  to  the  matter,  which  I  shall  now 
do.  The  ground  I  shall  put  it  upon  is,  that  two  millions 
Bteiling  a  year  will  support  a  sufficient  army,  and  all  the 
expenses  of  war  and  government,  without  having  recourse  to 
the  inconvenient  method  of  continually  calling  men  from 
their  employments,  which,  of  all  others,  is  the  most  expen- 
sive and  the  least  substantial.  I  consider  the  revenues 
created  by  taxes  as  the  first  and  principal  thing,  and  fines 
only  as  secondary  .and  accidental  things.  It  was  not  the  in- 
tention of  the  militia  law  to  apply  the  fines  to  any  thing 
else  but  the  support  of  the  militia,  neither  do  they  produce 
any  revenue  to  the  state,  yet  these  fines  amount  to  more 
than  all  the  taxes :  for  taking  the  muster-roll  to  be  sixty 
thousand  men,  the  fine  on  forty  thousand  who  may  not 
attend,  will  be  sixty  thousand  pounds  sterling,  and  those 
who  muster,  will  give  up  a  portion  of  time  equal  to  half  that 
sum,  and  if  the  eight  classes  should  be  called  within  the 
year,  and  one  third  turn  out,  the  fine  on  the  remaining  forty 
thousand  would  amount  to  seventy-two  millions  of  dollars^ 
beside  the  fifteen  shillings  on  every  hundred  pounds  of  pro- 
perty, and  the  charge  of  seven  and  a  half  per  cent,  for  col- 
lecting, in  certain  instances,  which,  on  the  whole,  would 
be  upwards  of  two  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  pounds  ster- 
ling. 

Now  if  those  very  fines  disable  the  country  from  raising  a 
sufficient  revenue  without  producing  an  equivalent  advan- 
tage, would  it  not  be  for  the  ease  and  interest  of  all  parties 
to  increase  the  revenue,  in  the  manner  I  have  proposed,  or 
any  better,  if  a  better  can  be  devised,  and  cease  the  opera- 
tion of  the  fines?  I  would  still  keep  the  militia  as  an 
organized  body  of  men,  and  should  there  be  a  real  neces- 
sity to  call  them  forth,  pay  them  out  of  the  proper  revenues 
of  the  state,  and  increase  the  taxes  a  third  or  fourth  per  cent. 
on  those  who  do  not  attend.  My  limits  will  not  allow  me 
to  go  further  into  this  matter,  which  I  shall  therefore  close 
with  this  remark ;  that  fines  are,  of  all  modes  of  revenue, 
the  most  unsuited  to  the  minds  of  a  free  country.  When  a 
man  pays  a  tax,  he  kno\vs  that  the  public  necessity  requires 
it,  and  therefore  feels  a  pride  in  discharging  his  duty ;  but 


THE   CBISIS.  133 

a  fine  seems  an  atonement  for  neglect  of  duty,  and  of  conse- 
quence is  paid  with  discredit,  and  frequently  levied  with 
severity. 

I  have  now  only  one  subject  more  to  speak  of,  with  which  I 
shall  conclude,  which  is,  tne  resolve  of  congress  of  the  18th 
of  March  last,  for  taking  up  and  funding  the  present  cur- 
rency at  forty  for  one,  and  issuing  new  money  in  it& 
steaa. 

Every  one  knows  that  I  am  not  the  flatterer  of  congress, 
but  in  this  instance  they  are  right  /  and  if  that  measure  is 
supported,  the  currency  will  acquire  a  value,  which,  with- 
out it,  it  will  not.  But  this  is  not  all :  it  will  give  relief  to 
the  finances  until  such  time  as  they  can  be  properly  ar- 
ranged, and  save  the  country  from  being  immediately 
double  taxed  under  the  present  mode.  In  short,  support 
that  measure,  and  it  will  support  you. 

I  have  now  waded  through  a  tedious  course  of  difficult 
business,  and  over  an  untrodden  path.  The  subject,  on 
every  point  in  which  it  could  be  viewed,  was  entangled  with 
perplexities,  and  enveloped  in  obscurity,  yet  such  are  the 
resources  of  America,  that  she  wants  nothing  but  system  to 
secure  success. 

COMMON  SENSIL. 

Philadelphia,  Oct.  6,  1780. 


NUMBER   XI. 
ON  THE  KING  OF  ENGLAND'S  SPEECH. 

OF  all  the  innocent  passions  which  actuate  the  human 
mind,  there  is  none  more  universally  prevalent  than  curiosity, 
It  reaches  all  mankind,  and  in  matters  which  concern  us,  or 
concern  us  not,  it  alike  provokes  in  us  a  desire  to  know 
them. 

Although  the  situation  of  America,  superior  to  every 
eifort  to  enslave  her,  and  daily  rising  to  importance  and  opu- 
lence, hath  placed  her  above  the  region  of  anxiety,  it  has 
still  left  her  within  the  circle  of  curiosity ;  and  her  fancy  to 
see  the  speech  of  a  man  who  had  proudly  threatened  to  bring 
her  to  his  feet,  was  visibly  marked  with  that  tranquil  con- 


134  THE   CRISIS. 

fidence  which  cared  nothing  about  its  contents.  It  was  in- 
quired after  with  a  smile,  read  with  a  laugh,  and  dismissed 
with  disdain. 

But,  as  justice  is  due,  even  to  an  enemy,  it  is  right  to  say. 
that  the  speech  is  as  well  managed  as  the  embarrassed  con- 
dition of  their  affairs  could  well  admit  of ;  and  though  hardly 
a  line  of  it  is  true,  except  the  mournful  story  of  Cornwallis, 
it  may  serve  to  amuse  the  deluded  commons  and  people  of 
England,  for  whom  it  was  calculated. 

"  The  war,"  says  the  speech,  "  is  still  unhappily  prolonged 
by  that  restless  ambition  which  first  excited  our  enemies  to 
commence  it,  and  which  still  continues  to  disappoint  my 
earnest  wishes  and  diligent  exertions  to  restore  the  public 
tranquillity." 

How  easy  it  is  to  abuse  truth  and  language,  when  men,  by 
habitual  wickedness,  have  learned  to  set  justice  at  defiance. 
That  the  very  man  who  began  the  war,  who  with  the  most 
sullen  insolence  refused  to  answer,  and  even  to  hear  the 
humblest  of  all  petitions,  who  hath  encouraged  his  officers 
and  his  army  in  the  most  savage  cruelties,  and  the  most 
scandalous  plunderings,  who  hath  stirred  up  the  Indians  on 
one  side,  and  the  negroes  on  the  other,  and  invoked  every 
aid  of  hell  in  his  behalf,  should  now,  with  an  affected  air  of 
pity,  turn  the  tables  from  himself,  and  charge  to  another  the 
wickedness  that  is  his  own,  can  only  be  equalled  by  the  base- 
ness of  the  heart  that  spoke  it. 

To  be  nobly  wrong  is  more  manly  than  to  be  meanly  right, 
is  an  expression  I  once  used  on  a  former  occasion,  and  it  is 
equally  applicable  now.  "We  feel  something  like  respect  for 
consistency  even  in  error.  We  lament  the  virtue  that  is  de- 
bauched into  a  vice,  but  the  vice  that  affects  a  virtue  becomes 
the  more  detestable :  and  amongst  the  various  assumptions 
of  character,  which  hypocrisy  has  taught,  and  men  have  prac 
tised,  there  is  none  that  raises  a  higher  relish  of  disgust,  than 
to  see  disappointed  inveteracy  twisting  itself,  by  the  most 
visible  falsehoods,  into  an  appearance  of  piety  which  it  has 
no  pretensions  to. 

"  But  I  should  not,"  continues  the  speech,  "  answer  the 
trust  committed  to  the  sovereign  of  a  free  people,  nor  make 
a  suitable  return  to  my  subjects  for  tneir  constant,  zealous, 
and  affectionate  attachment  to  my  person,  family  and  govern- 
ment, if  I  consented  to  sacrifice,  either  to  my  own  desire  of 
peace,  or  to  their  temporary  ease  and  relief,  those  essential 
riohts  and  permanent  interests,  upon  the  maintenance  and 


THE   CRISIS.  135 

preset  ation  of  which,  the  future  strength  and  security  of 
this  country  must  principally  depend." 

That  the  man  whose  ignorance  and  obstinacy  first  involved 
and  still  continues  the  nation  in  the  most  hopeless  and  ex- 
pensive of  all  wars,  should  now  meanly  flatter  them  with  the 
name  of  a  free  people,  and  make  a  merit  of  his  crime,  under 
the  disguise  of  their  essential  rights  and  permanent  interests, 
is  something  which  disgraces  even  the  character  of  perverse- 
ness.  Is  he  afraid  they  will  send  him  to  Hanover,  or  wjiat 
does  he  fear?  "Why  is  the  sycophant  thus  added  to  the 
hypocrite,  and  the  man  who  pretends  to  govern,  sunk  into 
the  humble  and  submissive  memorialist  ? 

What  those  essential  rights  and  permanent  interests  are, 
on  which  the  future  strength  and  security  of  England  must 
principally  depend,  are  not  so  much  as  alluded  to.  They  are 
words  which  impress  nothing  but  the  ear,  and  are  calculated 
only  for  the  sound. 

But  if  they  have  any  reference  to  America,  then  do  they 
amount  to  the  disgraceful  confession,  that  England,  who 
once  assumed  to  be  her  protectress,  has  now  become  her 
dependant.  The  British  king  and  ministry  are  constantly 
holding  up  the  vast  importance  which  America  is  of  to  Eng- 
land, in  order  to  allure  the  nation  to  carry  on  the  war :  now, 
whatever  ground  there  is  for  this  idea,  it  ought  to  have 
operated  as  a  reason  for  not  beginning  it ;  and,  therefore, 
they  support  their  present  measures  to  their  own  disgrace, 
because  the  arguments  which  they  now  use,  are  a  direct 
reflection  on  their  former  policy. 

"The  favorable  appearance  of  affairs,"  continues  the 
«peech,  "  in  the  East  Indies,  and  the  safe  arrival  of  the 
numerous  commercial  fleets  of  my  kingdom,  must  have  given 
you  satisfaction." 

That  things  are  not  quite  so  bad  every  where  as  in  America 
may  be  some  cause  of  consolation,  but  can  be  none  for 
triumph.  One  broken  leg  is  better  than  two,  but  still  it  is  not  a 
source  of  joy  :  and  let  the  appearance  of  affairs  in  the  East 
Indies  be  ever  so  favorable,  they  are  nevertheless  worse  than 
at  first,  without  a  prospect  of  tneir  ever  being  better.  But 
the  mournful  story  of  Cornwallis  was  yet  to  be  told,  and  it 
was  necessary  to  give  it  the  softest  introduction  possible. 

"  But  in  Ihe  course  of  this  year,"  continues  the  speech, 
u  my  assiduous  endeavors  to  guard  the  extensive  dominiona 
of  my  crown  have  not  been  attended  with  success  equal  to 
the  justice  and  uprightness  of  mv  views." — What  justice  and 


•136  THE   CRISIS. 

uprightness  there  was  in  beginning  a  war  with  America,  the 
world  will  judge  of,  and  the  unequalled  barbarity  with  which 
it  has  been  conducted,  is  not  to  be  worn  from  the  memory 
by  the  cant  of  snivelling  hypocrisy. 

"  And  it  is  with  great  concern  that  I  inform  you  that  the 
events  of  war  have  been  very  unfortunate  to  my  arms  in 
Virginia,  having  ended  in  the  loss  of  my  forces  in  that  pro 
vince." — And  our  great  concern  is  that  they  are  not  all 
served  in  the  same  manner. 

"  No  endeavors  have  been  wanting  on  my  part,"  says  the 
speech,  "  to  extinguish  that  spirit  of  rebellion  which  oui 
enemies  have  found  means  to  foment  and  maintain  in  the 
colonies  ;  and  to  restore  to  my  deluded  subjects  in  America 
that  happy  and  prosperous  condition  which  they  formerly 
derived  from  a  due  obedience  to  the  laws." 

The  expression  of  deluded  subjects  is  become  so  hacknied 
and  contemptible,  and  the  more  so  when  we  see  them  making 
prisoners  of  whole  armies  at  a  time,  that  the  pride  of  not 
being  laughed  at  would  induce  a  man  of  common  sense  to 
leave  it  off.  But  the  most  offensive  falsehood  in  the  para- 
graph, is  the  attributing  the  prosperity  of  America  to  a 
wrong  cause.  It  was  the  urn-emitted  industry  of  the  settlers 
and  their  descendants,  the  hard  labor  and  toil  of  persever- 
ing fortitude,  that  were  the  true  causes  of  the  prosperity  of 
America.  The  former  tyranny  of  England  served  to  people 
it,  and  the  virtue  of  the  adventurers  to  improve  it.  Ask  the 
man,  who,  with  his  axe  hath  cleared  a  way  in  the  wilder- 
ness, and  now  possesses  an  estate,  what  made  him  rich,  and 
he  will  tell  you  the  labor  of  his  hands,  the  sweat  of  his 
brow,  and  the  blessing  of  heaven.  Let  Britain  but  leave 
America  to  herself  and  she  asks  no  more.  She  has  risen 
into  greatness  without  the  knowledge  and  against  the  will 
of  England,  and  has  a  right  to  the  unmolested  enjoyment 
of  her  own  created  wealth. 

"  I  will  order,"  says  the  speech,  "  the  estimates  of  the 
ensuing  year  to  be  laid  before  you.  I  rely  on  your  wisdom  and 
public  spirit  for  such  supplies  as  the  circumstances  of  our 
affairs  shall  be  found  to  require.  Among  the  many  ill  con- 
sequences which  attend  the  continuation  of  the  present  war, 
I  most  sincerely  regret  the  additional  burdens  which  it  must 
unavoidably  bring  upon  my  faithful  subjects." 

It  is  strange  that  a  nation  must  run  through  such  a, 
labyrinth  of  trouble,  and  expend  such  a  mass  of  wealth  to 
gain  the  wisdom  which  an  hour's  reflection  might  have 


THE   CSISIB.  187 

taught.  The  final  superiority  of  America  over  every 
attempt  that  an  island  might  make  to  conquer  her,  was  as 
naturally  marked  in  the  constitution  of  things,  as  the  future 
ability  of  a  giant  over  a  dwarf  is  delineated  in  his  features 
while  an  infant.  How  far  providence,  to  accomplish  purposes 
which  no  human  wisdom  could  foresee,  permitted  such 
extraordinary  errors,  is  still  a  secret  in  the  womb  of  time, 
and  must  remain  so  till  futurity  shall  give  it  birth. 

"  In  the  prosecution  of  this  great  and  important  contest," 
says  the  speech,  "  in  which  we  are  engaged,  I  retain  a  firm 
confidence  in  the  protection  of  divine  providence  and  a  per- 
fect conviction  in  the  justice  of  my  cause,  and  I  have  no 
doubt,  but,  that  by  the  concurrence  and  support  of  my 
parliament,  by  the  valour  of  my  fleets  and  armies,  and  by  a 
vigorous,  animated,  and  united  exertion  of  the  faculties  and 
resources  of  my  people,  I  shall  be  enabled  to  restore  the 
blessings  of  a  safe  and  honorable  peace  to  all  my  domin- 
ions." 

The  king  of  England  is  one  of  the  readiest  believers  in  the 
world.  In  the  beginning  of  the  contest  he  passed  an  act  to 
put  America  out  of  the  protection  of  the  crown  of  England, 
and  though  providence,  for  seven  years  together,  hath  put 
him  out  of  her  protection,  still  the  man  has  no  doubt.  Like 
Pharaoh  on  the  edge  of  the  Ked  sea,  he  sees  not  the  plunge 
he  is  making,  and  precipitately  drives  across  the  flood  that 
is  closing  over  his  head. 

I  think  it  a  reasonable  supposition,  that  this  part  of  the 
speech  was  composed  before  the  arrival  of  the  news  of  the 
capture  of  Cornwallis :  for  it  certainly  has  no  relation  to 
their  condition  at  the  time  it  was  spoken.  But,  be  this  as 
it  may,  it  is  nothing  to  us.  Our  line  is  fixed.  Our  lot  is 
cast ;  and  America,  the  child  of  fate,  is  arriving  at  maturity. 
We  have  nothing  to  do  but  by  a  spirited  and  quick  exer- 
tion, to  stand  prepared  for  war  or  peace.  Too  great  to 
yield,  and  too  noble  to  insult ;  superior  to  misfortune,  and 
generous  in  success,  let  us  untaintedly  preserve  the  cha- 
racter which  we  have  gained,  and  show  the  future  ages  an 
example  of  unequalled  magnanimity.  There  is  something 
in  the  cause  and  consequence  of  America  that  has  drawn  on 
her  the  attention  of  all  mankind.  The  world  has  seen  her 
brave.  Her  love  of  liberty ;  her  ardour  in  supporting  it ; 
the  justice  of  her  claims,  and  the  constancy  of  her  fortitude 
has  won  her  the  esteem  of  Europe,  and  attached  to  her  in- 
terest the  first  power  in  that  country. 


138  THE   CRISIS. 

Her  situation  now  is  such,  that  to  whatever  point,  pasty 
present  or  to  come,  sne  casts  her  eyes,  new  matter  rises  to 
convince  her  that  she  is  right.  In  her  conduct  towards  her 
enemy,  no  reproachful  sentiment  lurks  in  secret.  No  sense 
of  injustice  is  left  upon  the  mind.  Untainted  with  ambition, 
and  a  stranger  to  revenge,  her  progress  hath  been  marked 
by  providence,  and  she,  in  every  stage  of  the  conflict,  has 
blest  her  with  success. 

But  let  not  America  wrap  herself  up  in  delusive  hope  and 
suppose  the  business  done.  The  least  remiosness  in  prepa- 
ration, the  least  relaxation  in  execution,  will  only  serve  to 
prolong  the  war,  and  increase  expenses.  If  our  enemies 
can  draw  consolation  from  misfortune,  and  exert  themselves 
upon  despair,  how  much  more  ought  we,  who  are  to  win  a 
continent  by  the  conquest,  and  have  already  an  earnest  of 
success  ? 

Having  in  the  preceding  part,  made  my  remarks  on  the 
several  matters  which  the  speech  contains,  I  shall  now  make 
my  remarks  on  what  it  does  not  contain. 

There  is  not  a  syllable  in  it  respecting  alliances.  Either 
the  injustice  of  Britain  is  too  glaring,  or  her  condition  too 
desperate,  or  both,  for  any  neighboring  power  to  come  to 
her  support.  In  the  beginning  of  the  contest,  when  she  had 
only  America  to  contend  witn,  she  hired  assistance  from 
Hesse,  and  other  smaller  states  of  Germany,  and  for  nearly 
three  years  did  America,  young,  raw,  undisciplined  and  un- 
provided, stand  against  the  power  of  Britain,  aided  by 
twenty  thousand  foreign  troops,  and  made  a  complete  con- 
quest of  one  entire  army.  The  remembrance  of  those  things 
ought  to  inspire  us  with  confidence  and  greatness  of  mind, 
and  carry  us  through  every  remaining  difficulty  with  con- 
tent and  cheerfulness.  What  are  the  little  sufferings  of  the 
present  day,  compared  with  the  hardships  that  are  past  ? 
There  was  a  time,  when  we  had  neither  house  nor  home  in 
safety ;  when  every  hour  was  the  hour  of  alarm  and  danger ; 
when  the  mind,  tortured  with  anxiety,  knew  no  repose, 
and  every  thing  but  hope  and  fortitude,  was  bidding  us 
farewell. 

I      It  is  of  use  to  look  back  upon  these  things ;  to  call  to 

/   mind  the  times  of  trouble  and  the  scenes  01  complicated 

*    anguish  that  are  past  and  gone.     Then  every  expense  was 

cheap,  compared  with  the  dread  of  conquest  and  the  misery 

of  submission.     We  did  not  stand  debating  upon  trifles,  or 

contending  about  the  necessary  and  unavoidable  charges  or 


THE   CRISIS.  189 

defence.  Every  one  bore  hie  lot  of  suffering,  and  looked  for- 
ward to  happier  days,  and  scenes  of  rest. 

Perhaps  one  of  tne  greatest  dangers  which  any  country 
can  be  exposed  to,  arises  from  a  kind  of  trifling  which  some- 
times steals  upon  the  mind,  when  it  supposes  the  danger 
past ;  and  this  unsafe  situation  marks  at  this  time  the 
peculiar  crisis  of  America.  What  would  she  once  have 
given  to  have  known  that  her  condition  at  this  day  should 
be  what  it  now  is  ?  And  yet  we  do  not  seem  to  place  a 
proper  value  upon  it,  nor  vigorously  pursue  the  necessary 
measures  to  secure  it.  We  know  that  we  cannot  be  defended, 
nor  yet  defend  ourselves,  without  trouble  and  expense.  We 
have  no  right  to  expect  it ;  neither  ought  we  to  look  for  it. 
We  are  apeople,  wno,  in  our  situation,  differ  from  all  the 
world.  We  form  one  common  floor  of  public  good,  and, 
whatever  is  our  charge,  it  is  paid  for  our  own  interest  and 
upon  our  own  account. 

Misfortune  and  experience  have  now  taught  us  system  and 
method ;  and  the  arrangements  for  carrying  on  the  war  are 
reduced  to  rule  and  order.  The  quotas  of  the  several  states 
are  ascertained,  and  I  intend  in  a  future  publication  to  show 
what  they  are,  and  the  necessity  as  well  as  the  advantages 
of  vigorously  providing  them. 

In  the  mean  time,  I  shall  conclude  this  paper  with  an 
instance  of  British  clemency,  from  Smollett's  History  of 
England,  vol.  xi.  p.  239,  printed  in  London.  It  will  serve 
to  show  how  dismal  the  situation  of  a  conquered  people  is, 
and  that  the  only  security  is  an  effectual  defence. 

We  all  know  that  the  Stuart  family  and  the  house  of 
Hanover  opposed  each  other  for  the  crown  of  England.  The 
Stuart  family  stood  first  in  the  line  of  succession,  but  the 
other  was  the  most  successful. 

In  July,  1745,  Charles,  the  son  of  the  exiled  king,  landed 
in  Scotland,  collected  a  small  force,  at  no  time  exceeding 
five  or  six  thousand  men,  and  made  some  attempts  to  re-es- 
tablish his  claim.  The  late  duke  of  Cumberland,  uncle  to 
the  present  king  of  England,  was  sent  against  him,  and  on 
the  16th  of  April  following,  Charles  was  totally  defeated  at 
Culloden,  in  Scotland.  Success  and  power  are  the  only 
situations  in  which  clemency  can  be  shown,  and  those  who 
are  cruel,  because  they  are  victorious,  can  with  the  same 
facility  act  any  other  degenerate  character. 

11  Immediately  after  tne  decisive  action  at  Culloden,  the 
duke  <-f  Cumberland  took  possession  of  Inverness;  where 


140  THE   CRISIS. 

six  and  thirty  deserters,  convicted  b/  a  court  martial,  were 
ordered  to  be  executed :  then  he  detached  several  parties  to 
ravage  the  country.  One  of  these  apprehended  the  Lady 
Mackintosh,  who  was  sent  prisoner  to  Inverness,  plundered 
her  house,  and  drove  away  Tier  cattle,  though  her  husband 
was  actually  in  the  service  of  the  government.  The  castle 
of  Lord  Lovat  was  destroyed.  The  French  prisoners  were 
sent  to  Carlisle  and  Penrith :  Kiimarnoek,  Balmerino, 
Cromartie,  and  his  son,  the  lord  Macleod,  were  conveyed  by 
sea  to  London ;  and  those  of  an  inferior  rank  were  confined 
in  different  prisons.  The  marquis  of  Tullibardine,  together 
with  a  brother  of  the  earl  of  Dunmore  and  Murray,  the 
pretender's  secretary,  were  seized  and  transported  to  the 
tower  of  London,  to  which  the  earl  of  Traquaire  had  been 
committed  on  suspicion ;  and  the  eldest  son  of  lord  Lovat 
was  imprisoned  in  the  castle  of  Edinburgh.  In  a  word,  all 
the  jails  in  Great  Britain,  from  the  capital,  northwards,  were 
filled  with  those  unfortunate  captives ,  and  great  numbers 
of  them  were  crowded  together  in  the  holds  of  ships,  where 
they  perished  in  the  most  deplorable  manner,  for  want  of 
air  and  exercise.  Some  rebel  chiefs  escaped  in  two  French 
frigates  that  arrived  on  the  coast  of  Lochaber  about  the  end 
of  April,  and  engaged  three  vessels  belonging  to  his  Britan- 
nic majesty,  which  they  obliged  to  retire.  Others  embarked 
on  board  a  ship  on  the  coast  of  Buchan,  and  were  conveyed 
to  Norway,  from  whence  they  travelled  to  Sweden.  In  the 
month  of  May,  the  duke  of  Cumberland  advanced  with  the 
army  into  the  Highlands,  as  far  as  fort  Augustus,  where  he 
encamped ;  and  sent  off  detachments  on  all  hands,  to  hunt 
down  the  fugitives,  acd  Jay  waste  the  country  with  fire  and 
sword.  The  castles  of  Glengary  and  Lochiel  were  plun- 
dered and  burned;  every  house,  hut,  or  habitation,  met 
with  the  same  fate,  without  distinction ;  and  all  the  cattle 
and  provision  were  carried  off ;  the  men  were  either  shot 
upon  the  mountains,  like  wild  beasts,  or  put  to  death  in  cold 
blood,  without  form  of  trial ;  the  women,  after  having  seen 
their  husbands  and  fathers  murdered,  were  subjected  to 
brutal  violation,  and  then  turned  out  naked,  with  their 
children,  to  starve  on  the  barren  heaths.  One  whole  family 
was-  enclosed  in  a  barn,  and  consumed  to  ashes.  Those 
ministers  of  vengeance  were  so  alert  in  the  execution  of 
their  oflfice,  that  in  a  few  days  there  was  neither  house,  cot- 
tage, man,  nor  beast,  to  be  seen  within  the  compass  of  fifty 
mites ;  all  was  ruin,  silence,  and  desolation." 


THE   CRISIS.  141 

I  have  here  presented  the  reader  with  one  of  the  most 
shocking  instances  of  cruelty  ever  practised,  and  I  leave  it 
to  rest  on  his  mind,  that  he  may  be  fully  impressed  with  a 
sense  of  the  destruction  he  has  escaped,  in  case  Britain  had 
conquered  America  :  and  likewise,  tnat  he  may  see  and  feel 
the  necessity,  as  well  for  his  own  personal  safety,  as  for  the 
honor,  the  interest,  and  happiness  of  the  whole  community, 
to  omit  or  delay  no  one  preparation  necessary  to  secure  tne 
ground  which  we  so  happily  stand  upon. 

TO  THE  PEOPLE  OF  AMERICA. 

On  the  expenses,  arrangements  and  disbursements  for  carrying  on  the 
war,  and  finishing  it  with  honor  and  advantage. 

WHEN  any  necessity  or  occasion  has  pointed  out  the  con- 
venience of  addressing  the  public,  I  have  never  made  it  a 
consideration  whether  the  subject  was  popular  or  unpopular, 
but  whether  it  was  right  or  wrong ;  for  that  which  is  right 
will  become  popular,  and  that  which  is  wrong,  though  by 
mistake  it  may  obtain  the  cry  or  fashion  of  the  day,  will 
soon  lose  the  power  of  delusion,  and  sink  into  disesteem. 

A  remarkable  instance  of  this  happened  in  the  case  of 
Silas  Deane;  and  I  mention  this  circumstance  with  the 
greater  ease,  because  the  poison  of  his  hypocrisy  spread  over 
the  whole  country,  and  every  man,  almost  without  excep- 
tion, thought  me  wrong  in  opposing  him.  The  best  friends 
I  then  had,  except  Mr.  Laurens,  stood  at  a  distance,  and  this 
tribute,  which  is  due  to  his  constancy,  I  pay  to  him  with 
respect,  and  that  the  readier,  because  he  is  not  here  to  hear 
it.  If  it  reaches  him  in  his  imprisonment,  it  will  afford  him 
an  agreeable  reflection. 

"  As  he  rose Uke  a  rocket,  he  would. fall  like  a  stick"  is  a 
metaphor  which  I  applied  to  Mr.  Deane,  in  the  first  piece 
which  I  published  respecting  him,  and  he  has  exactly  ful- 
filled the  description.  The  credit  he  so  unjustly  obtained 
from  the  public,  he  lost  in  almost  as  short  a  time.  The  de- 
lusion perished  as  it  fell,  and  he  soon  saw  himself  stripped 
of  popular  support.  His  more  intimate  acquaintances  began 
to  doubt,  and  to  desert  him  long  before  he  left  America,  and 
at  his  departure,  he  saw  himself  the  object  of  general  suspi- 
cion. When  he  arrived  in  France,  he  endeavored  to  effect 
bv  treason  what  he  had  failed  to  accomplish  by  fraud.  His 
plans,  schemes  and  projects,  together  with  his  expectation 


142  THE   CRISIS. 

of  being  sent  to  Holland  to  negotiate  a  loan  of  money,  had 
all  miscarried.  He  then  began  traducing  and  accusing 
America  of  every  crime,  which  could  injure  her  reputation. 
"  That  she  was  a  ruined  country ;  that  she  only  meant  to 
make  a  tool  of  France,  to  get  what  money  she  could  out  of 
her,  and  then  to  leave  her,  and  accommodate  with  Britain." 
Of  all  which  and  much  more,  Colonel  Laurens  and  myself 
when  in  France,  informed  Dr.  Franklin,  who  had  not  before 
heard  of  it.  And  to  complete  the  character  of  a  traitor,  he 
has,  by  letters  to  this  country  since,  some  of  which,  in  his 
own  hand  writing,  are  now  in  the  possession  of  congress, 
used  every  expression  and  argument  in  his  power,  to  injure 
the  reputation  of  France,  and  to  advise  America  to  renounce 
her  alliance,  and  surrender  up  her  independence.*  Thus  in 
France  he  abuses  America,  and  in  his  letters  to  America  he 
abuses  France ;  and  is  endeavoring  to  create  disunion  be- 
tween the  two  countries,  by  the  same  arts  of  double-dealing 
by  which  he  caused  dissentions  among  the  commissioners  in 
Paris,  and  distractions  in  America.  But  his  life  has  been 
fraud,  and  his  character  is  that  of  a  plodding,  plotting^ 
cringing  mercenary,  capable  of  any  disguise  that  suited  his 
purpose.  His  final  detection  has  very  happily  cleared  up 
those  mistakes,  and  removed  that  uneasiness,  which  his  un- 
principled conduct  occasioned.  Every  one  now  sees  him  in 
the  same  light ;  for  towards  friends  or  enemies  he  acted  with 
the  same  deception  and  injustice,  and  his  name,  like  that  of 
Arnold^  ought  now  to  be  forgotten  among  us.  As  this  is 
the  first  time  that  I  have  mentioned  him  since  my  return 
from  France,  it  is  my  intention  that  it  shall  be  the  last. 
From  this  digression,  which  for  several  reasons  I  thought 
necessary  to  give,  I  now  proceed  to  the  purport  of  my  ad- 
dress. 

I  consider  the  war  of  America  against  Britain  as  the 
country's  war,  the  public's  war,  or  the  war  of  the  people  in 
their  own  behalf,  for  the  security  of  their  natural  rights, 
and  the  protection  of  their  own  property.  It  is  not  the  war 
of  congress,  the  war  of  the  assemblies,  or  the  war  of  the 
government  in  any  line  whatever.  The  country  first,  by  a 

*  Mr.  William  Marshall,  of  this  city,  formerly  a  pilot,  who  had  been  taken  ;U 
sea  and  carried  to  England,  and  got  from  thence  to  France,  brought  over  let- 
ters from  Mr.  Deane  to  America,  one  of  which  was  directed  to  "  Robert  Mor- 
ris, Esq."  Mr.  Morris  sent  it  unopened  to  congress,  and  advised  Mr.  Marshall 
to  deliver  the  others  there,  which  he  did.  The  letters  were  of  the  same  pur- 
port with  those  which  have  been  already  published  under  the  signature  of  i 
Deane,  to  which  they  had  frequent  reference. 


THE   CRISIS.  145 

mutual  compact,  resolved  to  defend  their  rights  and  main- 
tain their  independence,  at  the  hazard  of  their  lives  and 
fortunes,  they  elected  their  representatives,  by  whom  they 
appointed  their  members  of  congress,  and  saia,  act  you  for 
us,  and  we  will  support  you.  Tnis  is  the  true  ground  and 
principle  of  the  war  on  the  part  of  America,  and,  conse- 
quently, there  remains  nothing  to  do,  but  for  every  one  to 
fulfil  his  obligation. 

It  was  next  to  impossible  that  a  new  country,  engaged  in 
a  new  undertaking,  could  set  off  systematically  right  at  first. 
She  saw  not  the  extent  of  the  struggle  that  she  was  involved 
in,  neither  could  she  avoid  the  beginning.  She  supposed 
every  step  that  she  took,  and  every  resolution  which  she 
formed,  would  bring  her  enemy  to  reason  and  close  the  con- 
test. Those  failing,  she  was  forced  into  new  measures ;  and 
these,  like  the  former,  being  fitted  to  her  expectations,  and 
failing  in  their  turn,  left  her  continually  unprovided,  and 
without  system.  The  enemy,  likewise,  was  induced  to  pro- 
secute the  wai ,  from  the  temporary  expedients  we  adopted 
for  carrying  it  on.  We  were  continually  expecting  to  see 
their  credit  exhausted,  and  they  were  looking  to  see  our 
currency  fail ;  and  thus,  between  their  watching  us,  and  we 
them,  the  hopes  of  both  have  been  deceived,  and  the  child- 
ishness of  the  expectation  has  served  to  increase  the  expense. 

Yet,  who  through  this  wilderness  of  error,  has  been  to 
blame  ?  Where  is  the  man  who  can  say  the  fault,  in  part, 
has  not  been  his?  They  were  the  natural,  unavoidable 
errors  of  the  day.  They  were  the  errors  of  a  whole  coun- 
try, which  nothing  but  experience  could  detect  and  time 
remove.  Neither  could  the  circumstances  of  America  ad- 
mit of  system,  till  either  the  paper  currency  was  fixed  or 
laid  aside.  No  calculation  of  a  finance  could  be  made  on 
medium  failing  without  reason,  and  fluctuating  without  rule. 

But  there  is  one  error  which  might  have  been  prevented 
and  was  not ;  and  as  it  is  not  my  custom  to  flatter,  but  to 
serve  mankind,  I  will  speak  it  freely.  It  certainly  was  the 
duty  of  every  assembly  on  the  continent  to  have  known,  at 
all  times,  what  was  the  condition  of  its  treasury,  and  to  have 
ascertained  at  every  period  of  depreciation,  how  much  the 
real  worth  of  the  taxes  fell  short  of  their  nominal  value. 
This  knowledge,  which  might  have  been  easily  gained,  in 
the  time  of  it,  would  have  enabled  them  to  have  kept  their 
constituents  well  informed,  and  this  is  one  of  the  greatest 
iuties  of  representation.  They  ought  to  have  studied  and 


144  THE   OttlSIS. 

calculated  the  expenses  of  the  war,  the  quota  of  each  state, 
and  the  consequent  proportion  that  would  fall  on  each  man's 
property  for  his  defence ;  and  this  must  easily  have  shown 
to  them,  that  a  tax  of  one  hundred  pounds  could  not  be  paid 
by  a  bushel  of  apples  or  an  hundred  of  flour,  which  was 
often  the  case  two  or  three  years  ago.  But  instead  of  this, 
which  would  have  been  plain  and  upright  dealing,  the  little 
line  of  temporary  popularity,  the  feather  of  an  hour's  dura- 
tion, was  too  much  pursued  ;  and  in  this  involved  condition 
of  things,  every  state,  for  the  want  of  a  little  thinking,  or 
a  little  information,  supposed  that  it  supported  the  whole 
expenses  of  the  war,  when  in  fact  it  fell,  by  the  time  the 
tax  was  levied  and  collected,  above  three-fourths  short  of  its 
own  quota. 

Impressed  with  a  sense  of  the  danger  to  which  the  coun- 
try was  exposed  by  this  lax  method  of  doing  business,  and 
the  prevailing  errors  of  the  day,  I  published,  last  October 
was  a  twelvemonth,  the  Crisis  No.  JL,  on  the  revenues  of 
America,  and  the  yearly  expense  of  carrying  on  the  war. 
My  estimation  of  the  latter,  together  with  the  civil  list  of 
congress  and  the  civil  list  of  the  several  states,  was  two  mil- 
lion pounds  sterling,  which  is  very  nearly  nine  millions  of 
dollars. 

Since  that  time,  congress  have  gone  into  a  calculation, 
and  have  estimated  the  expenses  of  the  war  department  and 
the  civil  list  of  congress  (exclusive  of  the  civil  list  of  the 
several  governments)  at  eight  millions  of  dollars ;  and  as  the 
remaining  million  will  be  fully  sufficient  for  the  civil  list 
of  the  several  states,  the  two  calculations  are  exceedingly 
near  each  other. 

The  sum  of  eight  millions  of  dollars  they  have  called  upon 
the  states  to  furnish,  and  their  quotas  are  as  follows,  which 
I  shall  preface  with  the  resolution  itself. 


"  By  the  United  States  in  congress  aMembled. 

October  80,  1781. 

"  Resolved,  That  the  respective  states  be  called  upon  to 
furnish  the  treasury  of  the  United  States  with  their  quotas 
of  eight  millions  of  dollars,  for  the  war  department  and  civil 
list  for  the  ensuing  year,  to  be  paid  quarterly,  in  equal  pro- 
portions, the  first  payment  to  be  made  on  the  first  day  of 
April  next. 

Jtesofaed,  That  a  committee  consisting  of  a  member  from 


THE   CRISIS.  145 

each  state,  be  appointed  to  apportion  to  the  several  statea 
the  quota  of  the  above  sum. 

"  November  2d.  The  committee  appointed  to  ascertain 
the  proportions  of  the  several  states  of  the  monies  to  be 
raised  for  the  expenses  of  the  ensuing  year,  report  the  fol- 
lowing resolutions : 

"  That  the  sum  of  eight  millions  of  dollars,  as  required  to 
be  raised  by  the  resolutions  of  the  30th  of  October  la^*  *>a 
paid  by  the  states  in  the  following  proportion : 

New-Hampshire $378,698 

Massachusetts 1,807,596 

Rhode  Island 216,684 

Connecticut    747,196 

New-York  878,598 

New-Jersey ....  485,679 

Pennsylvania 1,120,794 

Delaware , ... .  112,085 

Maryland 533,996 

Virginia 1,807,694 

North  Carolina 622,677 

South  Carolina 873,598 

Georgia 24,90ft 

$8,000,000 

"  ftesolved)  That  it  be  recommended  to  the  several  states, 
to  pay  taxes  for  raising  their  quotas  of  money  for  the  United 
States,  separate  from  those  laid  for  their  own  particular  use." 

On  these  resolutions  I  shall  offer  several  remarks. 

1st,  On  the  sum  itself,  and  the  ability  of  the  country. 

2d,  On  the  several  quotas,  and  the  nature  of  a  union. 
And, 

3d,  On  the  manner  of  collection  and  expenditure. 

1st,  On  the  sum  itself,  and  the  ability  of  the  country.  As 
I  know  my  own  calculation  is  as  low  as  possible,  and  as  the 
sum  called  for  by  congress,  according  to  their  calculation, 
agrees  very  nearly  therewith,  I  am  sensible  it  cannot  possibly 
be  lower.  Neither  can  it  be  done  for  that,  unless  there  is 
ready  money  to  go  to  market  with ;  and  even  in  that  case, 
it  is  only  by  the  utmost  management  and  economy  that  it 
can  be  maae  to  do. 

By  the  accounts  which  were  laid  before  the  British  parlia- 
ment last  spring,  it  appeared  that  the  charge  of  only  subsist- 
ing, that  is,  feeding  their  army  in  America,  cost  annually 
four  million  pounds  sterling,  which  is  verv  nearly  eighteen 
millions  of  dollars.  Now  if|  for  eight  millions,  we  can  feed, 
t-lot'he,  arm,  provide  for,  and  pay  an  army  sufficient  for  our 


146  THE   CKI8I8. 

defence,  the  very  comparison  shows  that  the  n-oney  must  be 
well  laid  out. 

It  may  be  of  some  use,  either  in  debate  or  conversation, 
to  attend  to  the  progress  of  the  expenses  of  an  army,  because 
it  will  enable  us  to  see  on  what  part  any  deficiency  will  fall. 

The  first  thing  is,  to  feed  them  and  provide  for  the  sick. 

Second  to  clothe  them. 

Third,  to  arm  and  furnish  them. 

Fourth,  to  provide  means  for  removing  them  from  place 
to  place.  And, 

Fifth,  to  pay  them. 

The  first  and  second  are  absolutely  necessary  to  them  as 
men.  The  third  and  fourth  are  equally  as  necessary  to  them 
as  an  army.  And  the  fifth  is  their  just  due.  Now  if  the 
sum  which  shall  be  raised  should  fall  short,  either  by  the 
several  acts  of  the  states  for  raising  it,  or  by  the  manner  of 
collecting  it,  the  deficiency  will  fall  on  the  fifth  head,  the 
soldiers'  pay,  which  would  be  defrauding  them,  and  eternally 
disgracing  ourselves.  It  would  be  a  blot  on  the  councils, 
the  country,  and  the  revolution  of  America,  and  a  man 
would  hereafter  be  ashamed  to  own  that  he  had  any  hand 
in  it. 

But  if  the  deficiency  should  be  still  shorter,  it  would  next 
fall  on  the  fourth  head,  the,  means  of  removing  the  a/rmy 
from  place  to  place  /  and,  in  this  case,  the  army  must  either 
stand  still  where  it  can  be  of  no  use,  or  seize  on  horses,  carts, 
wagons,  or  any  means  of  transportation  which  it  can  lay 
hold  of ;  and  in  this  instance  the  country  suffers.  In  short, 
every  attempt  to  do  a  thing  for  less  than  it  can  be  done  for, 
is  sure  to  become  at  last  both  a  loss  and  a  dishonor. 

But  the  country  cannot  bear  it,  say  some.  This  has  been 
the  most  expensive  doctrine  that  ever  was  held  out,  and  cost 
America  millions  of  money  for  nothing.  Can  the  country 
bear  to  be  overrun,  ravaged,  and  mined  by  an  enemy? 
Ihis  will  immediately  follow  where  defence  is  wanting,  and 
defence  will  ever  be  wanting  where  sufficient  revenues  are 
not  provided.  But  this  is  only  one  part  of  the  folly.  The 
second  is,  that  when  the  danger  comes,  invited  in  part  by 
Dur  not  preparing  against  it,  we  have  been  obliged,  in  a 
lumber  of  instances,  to  expend  double  the  sums  to  do  that 
which  at  first  might  have  been  done  for  half  the  money. 
But  this  is  not  all.  A  third  mischief  has  been,  that  grain 
«f  ail  sorts,  flour,  beef,  fodder,  horses,  carts,  wagons,  or  what- 
ever was  absolutely  or  imisenia  t<lv  wanted,  have  been  takeu 


THE   CRISIS.  147 

without  pay.  Now,  I  ask,  why  was  all  this  done,  but  from 
that  extremely  weak  and  expensive  doctrine,  that  the  country 
could  not  bear  it  f  That  is,  that  she  could  not  bear,  in  the 
first  instance,  that  which  would  have  saved  her  twice  as 
much  at  last ;  or,  in  proverbial  language,  that  she  could  not 
bear  to  pay  a  penny  to  save  a  pound  ;  the  consequence  of 
which  has  been,  that  she  has  paid  a  pound  for  a  penny. 
Why  are  there  so  many  unpaid  certificates  in  almost  every 
man's  hands,  but  from  the  parsimony  of  not  providing  suf- 
ficient revenues?  Besides,  the  doctrine  contradicts  itself; 
because,  if  the  whole  country  cannot  bear  it,  how  is  it 
possible  that  a  part  should  ?  And  yet  this  has  been  the 
case :  for  those  things  have  been  had ;  and  they  must  be 
had ;  but  the  misfortune  is,  that  they  have  been  obtained  in 
a  very  unequal  manner,  and  upon  expensive  credit,  whereas, 
with  ready  money,  they  might  have  been  purchased  for  half 
the  price,  and  nobody  distressed. 

But  there  is  another  thought  which  ought  to  strike  us, 
which  is,  how  is  the  army  to  bear  the  want  of  food,  clothing 
and  other  necessaries  ?  The  man  who  is  at  home,  can  turn 
himself  a  thousand  ways,  and  find  as  many  means  of  ease, 
convenience  or  relief:  but  a  soldier's  life  admits  of  none 
of  those :  their  wants  cannot  be  supplied  from  themselves  : 
for  an  army,  though  it  is  the  defence  of  a  state,  is  at  the 
aame  time  the  child  of  a  country,  or  must  be  provided  for  in 
every  thing. 

And  lastly,  The  doctrine  is  false.  There  are  not  three 
millions  of  people  in  any  part  of  the  universe,  who  live  so 
well,  or  have  such  a  fund  of  ability  as  in  America.  The  in- 
come of  a  common  laborer,  who  is  industrious,  is  equal  to 
that  of  the  generality  of  tradesmen  in  England.  In  the 
mercantile  line,  I  have  not  heard  of  one  who  could  be  said 
to  be  a  bankrupt  since  the  war  began,  and  in  England  they 
have  been  without  number.  In  America  almost  every  far- 
mer lives  on  his  own  lands,  and  in  England  not  one  in  a 
hundred  does.  In  short,  it  seems  as  if  the  poverty  of  that 
country  had  made  them  furious,  and  they  were  determined 
to  risk  all  to  recover  all. 

Yet,  notwithstanding  those  advantages  on  the  part  of 
America,  true  it  is,  that  had  it  not  been  for  the  operation  of 
taxes  for  our  necessary  defence,  we  had  sunk  into  a  state  of 
sloth  and  poverty :  for  there  was  more  wealth  lost  by  neglect- 
ing to  till  the  earth  in  the  years  1176,  '77,  '78,  than  the 
quota  of  taxes  (\inounts  to.  *That  which  is  lost  by  neglect. 


148  THE  CRISIS. 

of  this  kind,  is  lost  for  ever :  whereas  that  which  is  paid,  ana 
continues  in  the  country,  returns  to  us  again ;  and  at  the 
same  time  that  it  provides  us  with  defence,  it  operates  not 
only  as  a  spur,  but  as  a  premium  to  our  industry. 

I  shall  now  proceed  to  the  second  head,  viz.  on  the  s&vwal 
quotas,  and  the  natwe  of  a  imion. 

There  was  a  time  when  America  had  no  other  bond  of 
union,  than  that  of  common  interest  and  affection.  The 
whole  country  flew  to  the  relief  of  Boston,  and,  making  her 
cause  their  own,participated  in  her  cares  and  administered 
to  her  wants.  The  fate  of  war,  since  that  day,  has  carried 
the  calamity  in  a  ten-fold  proportion  to  the  southward ;  but 
in  the  mean  time  the  union  has  been  strengthened  by  a  legal 
compact  of  the  states,  jointly  and  severally  ratified,  and  that 
which  before  was  choice,  or  the  duty  of  affection,  is  now 
likewise  the  duty  of  legal  obligation. 

The  union  of  America  is  the  foundation-stone  of  her  inde- 
pendence ;  the  rock  on  which  it  is  built ;  and  is  something 
so  sacred  in  her  constitution,  that  we  ought  to  watch  every 
word  we  speak,  and  every  thought  we  think,  that  we  injure 
it  not,  even  by  mistake.  When  a  multitude,  extended,  or 
rather  scattered,  over  a  continent  in  the  manner  we  were, 
mutually  agree  to  form  one  common  centre  whereon  the 
whole  shall  move,  to  accomplish  a  particular  purpose,  all 
parts  must  act  together  and  alike,  or  act  not  at  all,  and  a 
stoppage  in  any  one  is  a  stoppage  of  the  whole,  at  least  for 
a  time. 

Thus  the  several  states  have  sent  representatives  to  assem- 
ble together  in  congress,  and  they  have  empowered  that 
body,  which  thus  becomes  their  centre,  and  are  no  other 
than  themselves  in  representation,  to  conduct  and  manage 
the  war,  while  their  constituents  at  home  attend  to  the  do- 
mestic cares  of  the  country,  their  internal  legislation,  their 
farms,  professions  or  employments  :  for  it  is  only  by  reducing 
complicated  things  to  method  and  orderly  connexion  that 
they  can  be  understood  with  advantage,  or  pursued  with 
success.  Congress,  by  virtue  of  this  delegation,  estimates 
the  expense,  and  apportions  it  out  to  the  several  parts  of  the 
empire  according  to  their  several  abilities;  and  here  trie 
debate  must  end,  because  each  state  has  already  had  its 
voice,  and  the  matter  has  undergone  its  whole  portion  of 
argument,  and  can  no  more  be  altered  by  any  particular 
state,  than  a  law  of  any  state,  after  it  has.  passed,  can  be 
altered  by  any  individual.  For  with  respect  to  those  thingg 


THE    CRISIS.  149 

irhicli  immediately  concern  the  union,  and  for  which  the 
union  was  purposely  established,  and  is  intended  to  secure, 
each  state  is  to  the  United  States  what  each  individual  is  tc 
the  state  he  lives  in.  And  it  is  on  this  grand  point,  this 
movement  upon  one  centre,  that  our  existence  as  a  nation, 
our  happiness  as  a  people,  and  our  safety  as  individuals, 
depend. 

It  may  happen  that  some  state  or  other  may  be  somewhat 
over  or  under  rated,  but  this  cannot  be  much.  The  ex- 
perience which  has  been  had  upon  the  matter,  has  nearly 
ascertained  their  several  abilities.  But  even  in  this  case,  it 
can  only  admit  of  an  appeal  to  the  United  States,  but  can- 
not authorise  any  state  to  make  the  alteration  itself,  any 
more  than  our  internal  government  can  admit  an  individual 
•to  do  so  in  the  case  of  an  act  of  assembly ;  for  if  one  state 
can  do  it,  than  may  another  do  the  same,  and  the  instant 
this  is  done  the  whole  is  undone. 

Neither  is  it  supposable  that  any  single  state  can  be  a 
judge  of  all  the  comparative  reasons  which  may  influence 
the  collective  body  in  arranging  the  quotas  of  the  continent. 
The  circumstances  of  the  several  states  are  frequently  vary- 
ing, occasioned  by  the  accidents  of  war  and  commerce,  and 
it  will  often  fall  upon  some  to  help  others,  rather  beyond  what 
their  exact  proportion  at  another  time  might  be ;  but  even 
this  assistance  is  as  naturally  and  politically  included  in  the 
idea  of  a  union,  as  that  of  any  particular  assigned  propor- 
tion ;  because  we  know  not  whose  turn  it  may  be  next  to 
want  assistance,  for  which  reason  that  state  is  the  wisest 
which  sets  the  best  example. 

Though  in  matters  of  bounden  duty  and  reciprocal  affec- 
tion, it  is  rather  a  degeneracy  from  the  honesty  and  ardour 
of  the  heart  to  admit  anything  selfish  to  partake  in  the 
government  of  our  conduct,  yet  in  cases  where  our  duty, 
our  affections,  and  our  interest  all  coincide,  it  may  be  of 
some  use  to  observe  their  union.  The  United  States  will 
become  heir  to  an  extensive  quantity  of  vacant  land,  and 
their  several  titles  to  shares  and  quotas  thereof,  will  naturally 
be  adjusted  according  to  their  relative  quotas  during  the 
war,  exclusive  of  that  inability  which  may  unfortunately 
arise  to  any  state  by  the  enemy's  holding  possession  of  a 
part ;  but  as  this  is  a  cold  matter  of  interest,  I  pass  it  by, 
and  proceed  to  my  third  head,  viz. 


160  THE   ClilSis. 


ON  THE  MANNER  OF  COLLECTION  AND  EXPENDITURE. 

IT  hath  been  our  error,  as  well  as  our  misfortune,  to 
blend  the  affairs  of  each  state,  especially  in  money  matters,, 
with  those  of  the  United  States ;  whereas,  it  is  our  ease, 
convenience  and  interest,  to  keep  them  separate.  The  ex- 
penses of  the  United  States  for  carrying  on  the  war,  and  the 
expenses  of  each  state  for  its  own  domestic  government,  are 
distinct  things,  and  to  involve  them  is  a  source  of  perplexity 
and  a  cloak  for  fraud.  I  love  method,  because  I  see  and 
am  convinced  of  its  beauty  and  advantage.  It  is  that  which 
makes  all  business  easy  and  understood,  and  without  which, 
everything  becomes  embarrassed  and  difficult. 

There  are  certain  powers  which  the  people  of  each  state 
have  delegated  to  their  legislative  and  executive  bodies,  and 
there  are  other  powers  which  the  people  of  every  state  have 
delegated  to  congress,  among  which  is  that  of  conducting 
the  war,  and,  consequently,  of  managing  the  expenses  at- 
cehding  it ;  for  how  else  can  that  be  managed,  which  con- 
cerns every  state,  but  by  a  delegation  from  each  ?  When  a 
state  has  furnished  its  quota,  it  has  an  undoubted  right  to 
know  how  it  has  been  applied,  and  it  is  as  much  the  duty 
of  congress  to  inform  the  state  of  the  one,  as  it  is  the  duty 
of  the  state  to  provide  the  other. 

In  the  resolution  of  congress  already  recited,  it  is  recom- 
mended to  the  several  states  to  lay  taxes  for  raising  their 
quotas  of  money  for  the  United  States,  separate  from  those 
laid  for  their  own  particular  use. 

This  is  a  most  necessary  point  to  be  observed,  and  the 
distinction  should  follow  all  the  way  through.  They  should 
be  levied,  paid  and  collected,  separately,  and  kept  separate 
in  every  instance.  Neither  have  the  civil  officers  of  any 
dtate,  or  the  government  of  that  state,  the  least  right  to 
touch  that  money  which  the  people  pay  for  the  support  of 
their  army  and  the  war,  any  more  than  congress  has  to 
touch  that  which  each  state  raises  for  its  own  use. 

This  distinction  will  naturally  be  followed  by  another.  It 
will  occasion  every  state  to  examine  nicely  into  the  expenses 
01  its  civil  list,  and  to  regulate,  reduce,  and  bring  it  into 
better  order  than  it  has  hitherto  been  ;  because  the  money 
for  that  purpose  must  be  raised  apart,  and  accounted  for  to 
the  public  separately.  But  while  the  monies  of  both  were 
blended,  the  necessary  nicety  was  not  observed,  and  th« 


g  THE   CRISIS.  151 

poor  soldier,  who  ought  to  have  been  the  first,  was  the  last 
who  was  thought  of. 

Another  convenience  will  be,  that  the  people,  by  paying 
the  taxes  separately,  will  know  what  they  are  for ;  and  will 
likewise  know  that  those  which  are  for  the  defence  of  the 
country  will  cease  with  the  war,  or  soon  after.  For  although, 
as  I  have  before  observed,  the  war  is  their  own,  and  for  the 
si:pport  of  their  own  rights  and  the  protection  of  their  own 
property,  yet  they  have  the  same  right  to  know,  that  they 
have  to  pay,  and  it  is  the  want  of  not  knowing  that  is  often 
the  cause  of  dissatisfaction. 

This  regulation  of  keeping  the  taxes  separate  has  given 
rise  to  a  regulation  in  the  office  of  finance,  by  which  it  was 
directed. 

"That  the  receivers  shall,  at  the  end  of  every  month, 
make  out  an  exact  account  of  the  monies  received  by  them 
respectively,  during  such  month,  specifying  therein  the 
names  of  the  persons  from  whom  the  same  shall  have  been 
received,  the  dates  and  the  sums ;  which  account  they  sliall 
respectively  cause  to  be  published  in  one  of  the  newspapers 
of  the  state ;  to  the  end  that  every  citizen  may  know  how 
much  of  the  monies  collected  from  him,  in  taxes,  is  trans- 
mitted to  the  treasury  of  the  United  States  for  the  suppor* 
of  the  war ;  and  also,  that  it  may  be  known  what  monies 
have  been  at  the  order  of  the  superintendent  of  finance.  It 
being  proper  and  necessary,  that,  in  a  free  country,  the 
people  should  be  as  fully  informed  of  the  administration  of 
their  affairs  as  the  nature  of  things  will  admit." 

It  is  an  agreeable  thing  to  see  a  spirit  of  order  and 
economy  taking  place,  after  such  a  series  of  errors  and  diffi- 
culties. A  government  or  an  administration,  who  means 
and  acts  honestly,  has  nothing  to  fear,  and  consequently  has 
nothing  to  conceal ;  and  it  would  be  of  use  if  a  monthly  or 
quarterly  account  was  to  be  published,  as  well  of  the  expen- 
ditures as  of  the  receipts.  Eight  millions  of  dollars  must 
be  husbanded  with  an  exceeding  deal  of  care  to  make  it  do, 
and,  therefore,  as  the  management  must  be  reputable,  the 
publication  would  be  serviceable. 

I  have  heard  of  petitions  which  have  been  presented  to  the 
assembly  of  this  state  (and  probably  the  same  may  have 
happened  in  other  states)  praying  to  have  the  taxes  lowered. 
Now  the  only  way  to  keep  taxes  low  is,  for  the  United  States 
to  have  ready  money  to  go  to  market  with  :  and  though  tho 
taxes  to  be  raised  for  the  present  year  will  fall  heavy,  and 


152  THE   OKI  SIS. 

there  will  naturally  be  some  difficulty  in  paying  them,  yet 
the  difficulty,  in  proportion  as  money  spreads  about  the 
country,  will  every  day  grow  less,  and  in  the  end  we  shall 
gave  some  millions  of  dollars  by  it.  We  see  what  a  bitter, 
revengeful  enemy  we  have  to  deal  with,  and  any  expense  is 
cheap  compared  to  their  merciless  paw.  We  have  seen  the 
unfortunate  Carolineans  hunted  like  partridges  on  the  moun- 
tains, and  it  is  only  by  providing  means  for  our  defence,  that 
we  shall  be  kept  from  the  same  condition.  When  we  think 
or  talk  about  taxes,  we  ought  to  recollect  that  we  lie  down 
in  peace  and  sleep  in  safety ;  that  we  can  follow  our  farms 
or  stores  or  other  occupations,  in  prosperous  tranquillity; 
and  that  these  inestimable  blessings  are  procured  to  us  by 
the  taxes  that  we  pay.  In  this  view,  our  taxes  are  pro- 
perly our  insurance  money;  they  are  what  we  pay  to  be 
made  safe,  and,  in  strict  policy,  are  the  best  money  we  can 
lay  out. 

It  was  my  intention  to  offer  some  remarks  on  th,e  impost 
law  of  five  per  cent,  recommended  by  congress,  and  to  be 
established  as  a  fund  for  the  payment  of  the  loan-office  cer- 
tificates, and  other  debts  of  the  United  States ;  but  I  have 
already  extended  my  piece  beyond  my  intention.  And  as 
this  fund  will  make  our  system  of  finance  complete,  and  is 
strictly  just,  and  consequently  requires  nothing  but  honesty 
to  do  it,  there  needs  but  little  to  be  said  upon  it. 

COMMON  SENSE, 

Philadelphia,  March  5,  1782. 


NUMBER  XH. 
ON  THE  PRESENT  STATE  OF  NEWS. 

SINCE  the  arrival  of  two,  if  not  three  packets,  in  quick 
succession,  at  New- York,  from  England,  a  variety  of  uncon- 
nected news  has  circulated  through  the  country,  and  afforded 
as  great  a  variety  of  speculation. 

That  something  is  the  matter  in  the  cabinet  and  councils 
of  our  enemies,  on  the  other  side  of  the  water,  is  certain — 
that  they  have  run  their  length  of  madness,  and  are  under 
the  necessity  of  changing  their  measures  may  easily  be  seen 


THE   OEI8I8.  153 

into;  but  to  what  this  change  of  measures  may  amount,  or 
how  far  it  may  correspond  with  our  interest,  happiness  and 
duty,  is  yet  uncertain  ;  and  from  what  we  have  Thitherto  ex- 
perienced, we  have  too  much  reason  to  suspect  them  in  every 
thing. 

I  do  not  address  this  publication  so  much  to  the  people  of 
America  as  to  the  British  ministry,  whoever  they  may  be, 
for  if  it  is  their  intention  to  promote  any  kind  of  negotia- 
tion, it  is  proper  they  should  know  beforehand,  that  the 
United  States  nave  as  much  honor  as  bravery  ;  and  that  they 
are  no  more  to  be  seduced  from  their  alliance ;  that  their 
line  of  politics  is  formed  and  not  dependant,  like  that  of  their 
enemy,  on  chance  and  accident. 

On  our  part,  in  order  to  know,  at  any  time,  what  the 
British  government  will  do,  we  have  only  to  find  out  what 
they  ought  not  to  do,  and  this  last  will  be  their  conduct 
Forever  changing  and  forever  wrong ;  too  distant  from  Amer 
ica  to  improve  in  circumstances,  and  too  unwise  to  foresee 
them ;  scheming  without  principle,  and  executing  without 
probability,  their  whole  line  of  management  has  hitherto 
been  blunder  and  baseness.  Every  campaign  has  added 
to  their  loss,  and  every  year  to  their  disgrace :  till  unable  to 
go  on,  and  ashamed  to  go  back,  their  politics  have  come  to 
a  halt,  and  all  their  fine  prospects  to  a  halter. 

Could  our  affections  forgive,  or  humanity  forget  the 
wounds  of  an  injured  country — we  might,  under  the  influ- 
ence of  a  momentary  oblivion,  stand  still  and  laugh.  But 
they  are  engraven  where  no  amusement  can  conceal  them, 
and  of  a  kind  for  which  there  is  no  recompense.  Can  ye 
restore  to  us  the  beloved  dead  ?  Can  ye  say  to  the  grave, 
give  up  the  murdered  ?  Can  ye  obliterate  from  our  memo- 
ries those  who  are  no  more?  Think  not  then  to  tamper 
with  our  feelings  by  insidious  contrivance,  nor  suffocate  oui 
humanity  by  seducing  us  to  dishonor. 

In  March  1780,  I  published  part  of  the  Crisis,  No.  VIII. 
in  the  newspapers,  but  did  not  conclude  it  in  the  following 
papers,  and  the  remainder  has  lain  by  me  till  the  present 
day. 

There  appeared  about  that  time  some  disposition  in  the 
British  cabinet  to  cease  the  further  prosecution  of  the  war, 
and  as  I  had  formed  my  opinion  that  whenever  such  a  de- 
sign should  take  place,  it  would  be  accompanied  with  a  dis- 
honorable proposition  to  America,  respecting  France,  I  had 
suppressed  the  remainder  of  that  number,  not  to  expose  the 


154  THE    OEI8I8. 

baseness  of  any  such  proposition.  But  the  arrival  oi  the 
next  news  from  England,  declared  her  determination  to  go 
on  with  the  war,  and  consequently  as  the  political  object  1 
had  then  in  view  was  not  become  a  subject,  it  was  unneces- 
sary in  me  to  bring  it  forward,  which  is  the  reason  it  was 
never  published. 

The  matter  which  I  allude  to  in  the  unpublished  part,  I 
shall  now  make  a  quotation  of,  and  apply  it  as  the  more  en- 
larged state  of  things,  at  this  day,  shall  make  convenient  or 
necessary. 

It  was  as  follows : 

"  By  the  speeches  which  have  appeared  from  the  British 
parliament,  it  is  easy  to  perceive  to  what  impolitic  and  im- 
prudent excesses  their  passions  and  prejudices  have,  in  every 
instance,  carried  them  during  the  present  war.  Provoked 
at  the  upright  and  honorable  treaty  between  America  and 
France,  they  imagined  that  nothing  more  was  necessary  to 
be  done  to  prevent  its  final  ratification,  than  to  promise, 
through  the  agency  of  their  commissioners  (Carlisle,  Eden 
and  Johnston)  a  repeal  of  their  once  offensive  acts  of  parlia- 
ment. The  vanity  of  the  conceit,  was  as  unpardonable  as 
the  experiment  was  impolitic.  And  so  convinced  am  I  of 
their  wrong  ideas  of  America,  that  I  shall  not  wonder,  if  in 
their  last  stage  of  political  phrenzy,  they  propose  to  her  to 
break  her  alliance  with  France,  and  enter  into  one  with 
them.  Such  a  proposition,  should  it  ever  be  made,  and  it 
has  been  already  more  than  once  hinted  at  in  parliament, 
would  discover  such  a  disposition  to  perfidiousness,  and  such 
disregard  of  honor  and  morals,  as  would  add  the  finishing 
vice  to  national  corruption. — I  do  not  mention  this  to  put 
America  on  the  watch,  but  to  put  England  on  her  guard, 
that  she  do  not,  in  the  looseness  of  her  heart,  envelope  in 
disgrace  every  fragment  of  her  reputation."  Thus  far  the 
quotation. 

By  the  complexion  of  some  part  of  the  news  which  has 
transpired  through  the  New- York  papers,  it  seems  probable 
that  this  insidious  era  in  the  British  politics  is  beginning  to 
make  its  appearance.  I  wish  it  may  not ;  for  that  which  is 
a  disgrace  to  human  nature,  throws  something  of  a  shade 
over  all  the  human  character,  and  each  individual  feels  his 
share  of  the  wound  that  is  given  to  the  whole. 

The  policy  of  Britain  has  ever  been  to  divide  America  in 
some  way  or  other.  In  the  beginning  of  the  dispute,  she 
practised  every  art  to  prevent  or  destroy  the  union  of  the 


THE   CRISIS.  155 

states,  weLI  knowing  that  could  she  once  get  them  to  stand 
singly,  she  could  conquer  them  unconditionally.  Failing  in 
this  project  in  America,  she  renewed  it  in  Europe;  and, 
after  the  alliance  had  taken  place,  she  made  secret  offers  to 
France  to  induce  her  to  give  up  America ;  and  what  is  still 
more  extraordinary,  she  at  the  same  time  made  propositions 
to  Dr.  Franklin,  then  iu  Paris,  the  very  court  to  which  she 
was  secretly  applying,  to  draw  off  America  from  France. 
But  this  is  not  all. 

On  the  14th  of  September,  1778,  the  British  court,  through 
their  secretary,  lord  "Weymouth,  made  application  to  the 
marquis  d'Almodovar,  the  Spanish  ambassador  at  London, 
to  "  ask  the  mediation"  for  these  were  the  words,  of  the  court 
of  Spain,  for  the  purpose  of  negociating  a  peace  with  France, 
leaving  America  (as  I  shall  hereafter  show)  out  of  the  ques- 
tion. Spain  readily  offered  her  mediation,  and  likewise  the 
city  of  Madrid  as  the  place  of  conferr-nce,  but  withal,  pro- 
posed, that  the  United  States  of  America  should  be  invited 
to  the  treaty,  and  considered  as  independent  during  the  time 
the  business  was  negotiating.  But  this  was  not  the  view  of 
England.  She  wanted  to  draw  France  from  the  war,  that 
she  might  uninterruptedly  pour  out  all  her  force  and  fury 
upon  America ;  and  being  disappointed  in  this  plan,  as  well 
through  the  open  and  generous  conduct  of  Spain,  as  the 
determination  of  France,  she  refused  the  mediation  which 
she  had  solicited. 

I  shall  now  give  some  extracts  from  the  justifying  memo- 
rial of  the  Spanish  court,  in  which  she  has  set  the  conduct 
and  character  of  Britain,  with  respect  to  America,  in  a  clear 
and  striking  point  of  light. 

The  memorial,  speaking  of  the  refusal  of  the  British  court 
to  meet  in  conference,  with  commissioners  from  the  United 
States,  who  were  to  be  considered  as  independent  during  the 
time  of  the  conference,  says, 

"  It  is  a  thing  very  extraordinary  and  even  ridiculous,  thai 
the  court  of  London,  who  treats  the  colonies  as  independent, 
not  only  in  acting,  but  of  right,  during  the  war,  should  have 
a  repugnance  to  treat  them  as  such  only  in  acting  during  a 
truce,  or  suspension  of  hostilities.  The  convention  of  Sara 
toga  ;  the  reputing  general  Burgoyne  as  a  lawful  prisoner, 
in  order  to  suspend  his  trial ;  the  exchange  and  liberation 
of  other  prisoners  made  from  the  colonies ;  the  having 
named  commissioners  to  go  and  supplicate  the  Americans, 
at  their  own  doors,  request  peace  of  them,  ?i;;d  treat  with 


156  THE   CRISIS. 

them  and  the  congress :  and,  finally,  by  a  thousand  other 
acts  of  this  sort,  authorized  by  the  court  of  London,  which 
have  been,  and  are  true  signs  of  the  acknowledgment  of 
their  independence. 

"  In  aggravation  of  all  the  foregoing,  at  the  same  time 
the  British  cabinet  answered  the  king  of  Spain  in  the  terms 
already  mentioned,  they  were  insinuating  themselves  at  the 
court  of  France  by  means  of  secret  emissaries,  and  making 
very  great  offers  to  her,  to  abandon  the  colonies  and  make 
peace  with  England.  But  there  is  yet  more ;  for  at  this 
same  time  the  English  ministry  were  treating,  by  means  of 
another  certain  emissary,  with  Dr.  Franklin,  minister  pleni- 
potentiary from  the  colonies,  residing  at  Paris,  to  whom  they 
made  various  proposals  to  disunite  them  from  France,  and 
accommodate  matters  with  England. 

"  From  what  has  been  observed,  it  evidently  follows,  that 
the  whole  of  the  British  politics  was,  to  disunite  the  two 
courts  of  Paris  and  Madrid,  by  means  of  the  suggestions  and 
offers  which  she  separately  made  to  them  ;  and  also  to  sepa- 
rate the  colonies  from  their  treaties  and  engagements  entered 
into  with  France,  and  induce  them  to  arm  against  the  house 
of  Bourbon,  or  more  probably  to  oppress  them  when  they 
foitnd^from  breaking  their  engagements,  that  they  stood  alone 
and  without  protection. 

"  This,  therefore,  is  the  net  they  laid  for  the  American 
states ;  that  is  to  say,  to  tempt  them  with  flattering  and 
very  magnificent  promises  to  come  to  an  accommodation 
with  them,  exclusive  of  any  intervention  of  Spain  or  France, 
that  the  British  ministry  might  always  remain  the  arbiters 
of  the  fate  of  the  colonies. 

"  But  the  Catholic  king  (the  king  of  Spain)  faithful  on  the 
one  part  of  the  engagements  whicn  bind  him  to  the  Most 
Christian  king  (the  king  of  France')  his  nephew ;  just  and 
upright  on  the  other,  to  ms  own  subjects,  whom  he  ought  to 
protect  and  guard  against  so  many  insults  ;  and  finally,  full 
of  humanity  and  compassion  for  the  Americans  and  other 
individuals  who  suffer  in  the  present  war ;  he  is  determined 
to  pursue  and  prosecute  it,  and  to  make  all  the  efforts  in  his 
power,  until  he  can  obtain  a  solid  and  permanent  peace, 
with  full  and  satisfactory  securities  that  it  shall  be  observed." 

Thus  far  the  memorial ;  a  translation  of  which  into  Eng- 
lish, may  be  seen  in  full,  under  the  head  of  State  Papers,  in 
the  Annual  Kegister,  for  17T9,  p.  367. 

The  extracts  I  have  here  given,  serve  to  show  the  various 


THE   CRISIS.  157 

endeavors  and  contrivances  of  the  enemy,  to  draw  France 
from  her  connection  with  America,  and  to  prevail  on  her  to 
make  a  separate  peace  with  England,  leaving  America 
totally  out  of  the  question,  and  at  the  mercy  of  a  merciless, 
unprincipled  enemy.  The  opinion,  likewise,  which  Spain 
has  formed  of  the  British  cabinet  character,  for  meanness 
and  perfidiousness,  is  so  exactly  the  opinion  of  America, 
respecting  it,  that  the  memorial,  in  this  instance,  contains 
our  own  statements  and  language ;  for  people,  however 
remote,  who  think  alike,  will  unavoidably  speak  alike. 

Thus  we  see  the  insidious  use  which  Britain  endeavoured 
to  make  of  the  propositions  of  peace  under  the  mediation  of 
Spain.  I  shall  now  proceed  to  the  second  proposition  under 
the  mediation  of  the  emperor  of  Germany  and  the  empress 
of  Russia  ;  the  general  outline  of  which  was,  that  a  congress 
of  the  several  powers  at  war,  should  meet  at  Yienna,  in  1781, 
to  settle  preliminaries  of  peace. 

I  could  wish  myself  at  liberty  to  make  use  of  all  the  infor- 
mation which  I  am  possessed  of  on  this  subject,  but  as  there 
is  a  delicacy  in  the  matter,  I  do  not  conceive  it  prudent,  at 
least  at  present,  to  make  references  and  quotations  in  the 
same  manner  as  I  have  done  with  respect  to  the  mediation 
of  Spain,  who  published  the  whole  proceedings  herself ;  and 
therefore,  what  comes  from  me,  on  this  part  of  the  business, 
must  rest  on  my  own  credit  with  the  public,  assuring  them, 
that  when  the  whole  proceedings,  relative  to  the  proposed 
congress  of  Yienna,  shall  appear,  they  will  find  my  account 
not  only  true,  but  studiously  moderate. 

"We  know  at  the  time  this  mediation  was  on  the  carpet, 
the  expectation  of  the  British  king  and  ministry  ran  Ingh 
with  respect  to  the  conquest  of  America.  The  English 
packet  which  was  taken  with  the  mail  on  board,  and  carried 
into  1'Orient,  in  France,  contained  letters  from  lord  G.  Ger- 
maine  to  Sir  Henry  Clinton,  which  expressed  in  the  fullest 
terms  the  ministerial  idea  of  a  total  conquest.  Copies  of 
those  letters  were  sent  to  congress  and  published  in  the  news- 
papers of  last  year.  Colonel  Laurens  brought  over  the 
originals,  some  of  which,  signed  in  the  hand  writing  of  the 
then  secretary,  Germaine,  are  now  in  my  possession. 

Filled  with  these  high  ideas,  nothing  could  be  more  inso- 
lent towards  America  than  the  language  of  the  British  court 
on  the  proposed  mediation.  A  peace  with  France  and 
Spain  she  anxiously  solicited  ;  but  America,  as  before,  was 
to  be  left  to  her  mercy,  neither  would  she  hear  any  proposi- 


THE   CRISIS. 

tion  for  admitting  an  agent  from  the  United  States  into  the 
congress  of  Vienna. 

On  the  other  hand,  France,  with  an  open,  noble,  and 
manly  determination,  and  the  fidelity  of  a  good  ally,  would 
hear  no  proposition  for  a  separate  peace,  nor  even  meet  in 
congress  at  Vienna,  without  an  agent  from  America :  and 
likewise  that  the  independent  character  of  the  United  States, 
represented  by  the  agent,  should  be  fully  and  unequivocally 
defined  and  settled  before  any  conference  should  be  entered 
on.  The  reasoning  of  the  court  of  France  on  the  several 
propositions  of  the  two  imperial  courts,  which  relate  to  us, 
is  rather  in  the  style  of  an  American  than  an  ally,  and  she 
advocated  the  cause  of  America  as  if  she  had  been  America 
herself. — Thus  the  second  mediation,  like  the  first,  proved 
ineffectual. 

But  since  that  time,  a  reverse  of  fortune  has  overtaken  the 
British  arms,  and  all  their  high  expectations  are  dashed  to 
the  ground.  The  noble  exertions  to  the  southward  under 
general  Greene ;  the  successful  operations  of  the  allied  arms 
in  the  Chesapeake ;  the  loss  of  most  of  their  islands  in  the 
West  Indies,  and  Minorca  in  the  Mediterranean  ;  the  perse  •' 
vering  spirit  of  Spain  against  Gibraltar ;  the  expected  cap- 
ture of  Jamaica ;  the  failure  of  making  a  separate  peace 
with  Holland,  and  the  expense  of  an  hundred  millions  ster- 
ling, by  which  all  these  fine  losses  were  obtained,  have  read 
them  a  loud  lesson  of  disgraceful  misfortune,  and  necessity 
has  called  on  them  to  change  their  ground. 

In  this  situation  of  confusion  and  despair  their  present 
councils  have  no  fixed  character.  It  is  now  the  hurricane 
months  of  British  politics.  Every  day  seems  to  have  a  storm 
of  its  own,  and  they  are  scudding  under  the  bare  poles  of 
hope.  Beaten,  but  not  humble ;  condemned,  but  not  peni- 
tent ;  they  act  like  men  trembling  at  fate  and  catching  at  a 
straw.  From  this  convulsion,  in  the  entrails  of  their  poli- 
tics, it  is  more  than  probable,  that  the  mountain  groaning 
in  labor,  will  bring  forth  a  mouse,  as  to  its  size,  and  a  mon- 
ster in  its  make.  They  will  try  on  America  the  same  in- 
sidious arts  they  tried  on  France  and  Spain. 

We  sometimes  experience  sensations  to  which  language  is 
not  equal.  The  conception  is  too  bulky  to  be  born  alive, 
and  in  the  torture  of  thinking,  we  stand  dumb.  Our  feel- 
ings, imprisoned  by  their  magnitude,  find  no  way  out — and. 
in  the  struggle  01  expression,  every  finger  tries  to  be  a 
tongue..  The  machinery  of  the  body  seems  too  little  for 


THE   CRISIS.  159 

the  inind,  and  we  look  about  for  helps  to  show  our  thought* 
by.  Such  must  be  the  sensation  of  America,  whenever 
Britain,  teeming  with  corruption,  shall  propose  to  her  to 
sacrifice  her  faith. 

But,  exclusive  of  the  wickedness,  there  is  a  personal 
offence  contained  in  eveiy  such  attempt.  It  is  calling  us 
villains :  for  no  man  asks  another  to  act  the  villain  unless 
he  believes  him  inclined  to  be  one.  No  man  attempts  to 
seduce  a  truly  honest  woman.  It  is  the  supposed  looseness 
of  her  mind  that  starts  the  thoughts  of  seduction,  and  he 
who  offers  it  calls  her  a  prostitute.  Our  pride  is  always 
hurt  by  the  same  propositions  which  offend  our  principles  ; 
for  when  we  are  shocked  at.  the  crime  we  are  wounded  by 
the  suspicion  of  our  compliance. 

Could  I  convey  a  thought  that  might  serve  to  regulate  the 
public  mind,  I  would  not  make  the  interest  of  the  alliance 
the  basis  of  defending  it.  All  the  world  are  moved  by  in- 
terest, and  it  affords  them  nothing  to  boast  of.  But  I  would 
.go  a  step  higher,  and  defend  it  on  the  ground  of  honour  and 
'principle.  That  our  public  affairs  have  flourished  under  the 
alliance — that  it  was  wisely  made,  and  has  been  nobly  ex- 
ecuted— that  by  its  assistance  we  are  enabled  to  preserve 
our  country  from  conquest,  and  expel  those  who  sought  our 
destruction — that  it  is  our  true  interest  to  maintain  it  un- 
impaired, and  that  while  we  do  so  no  enemy  can  conquer 
us,  are  matters  which  experience  has  taught  us,  and  the 
common  good  of  ourselves,  abstracted  from  principles  of 
faith  and  honor,  would  lead  us  to  maintain  the  connex- 
ion. 

But  over  and  above  the  mere  letter  of  the  alliance,  we 
have  been  nobly  and  generously  treated,  and  have  had  the 
same  respect  and  attention  paid  to  us,  as  if  we  had  been  an 
old  established  country.  To  oblige  and  be  obliged  is  fair 
work  among  mankind,  and  we  want  an  opportunity  of 
showing  to  the  world  that  we  are  a  people  sensible  of  kind- 
ness and  worthy  of  confidence.  Character  is  to  us,  in  our 
present  circumstances,  of  more  importance  than  interest. 
We  are  a  young  nation,  just  stepping  upon  the  stage  of 
public  lite,  and  the  eye  of  the  world  is  upon  us  to  see  how 
we  act.  We  have  an  enemy  who  is  watching  to  destroy 
our  reputation,  and  who  will  go  any  length  to  gain  some 
evidence  against  us,  that  may  serve  to  render  our  conduct 
suspected,  and  our  character  odious;  because,  could  she 
accomplish  this,  wicked  as  it  is,  the  world  would  withdraw 


160  THE   CEI8I8. 

from  us,  as  from  a  people  not  to  be  trusted,  and  our  task 
would  then  become  difficult. 

There  is  nothing  which  sets  the  character  of  a  nation  in  a 
higher  or  lower  light  with  others,  than  the  faithfully  ful- 
filling, or  perfidiously  breaking  of  treaties.  They  are  things 
not  to  be  tampered  with :  and  should  Britain,  which  seems 
very  probable,  propose  to  seduce  America  into  such  an  act 
of  baseness,  it  would  merit  from  her  some  mark  of  unusual 
detestation.  It  is  one  of  those  extraordinary  instances  in 
which  we  ought  not  to  be  contented  with  the  bare  negative 
of  congress,  because  it  is  an  affront  on  the  multitude  as  well 
as  on  the  government.  It  goes  on  the  supposition  that  the 
public  are  not  honest  men,  and  that  they  may  be  managed 
by  contrivance,  though  they  cannot  be  conquered  by  arms. 
But,  let  the  world  and  Britain  know,  that  we  are  neither 
to  be  bought  nor  sold.  That  our  mind  is  great  and  fixed ; 
our  prospect  clear ;  and  that  we  will  support  our  character 
as  firmly  as  our  independence. 

But  I  will  go  still  further ;  general  Conway,  who  made 
the  motion,  in  the  British  parliament,  for  discontinuing ' 
offensive  war  in  America,  is  a  gentleman  of  an  amiable 
character.  We  have  no  personal  quarrel  with  him.  But 
he  feels  not  as  we  feel ;  he  is  not  in  our  situation,  and  that 
alone,  without  any  other  explanation,  is  enough. 

The  British  parliament  suppose  they  have  many  friends  in 
America,  and  that,  when  all  chance  of  conquest  is  over,  they 
will  be  able  to  draw  her  from  her  alliance  with  France. 
Now,  if  I  have  any  conception  of  the  human  heart,  they  will 
fail  in  this  more  than  in  any  thing  that  they  have  yet  tried. 

This  part  of  the  business  is  not  a  question  of  policy  only, 
but  of  honor  and  honesty ;  and  the  proposition  will  have  in 
it  something  so  visibly  low  and  base,  that  their  partisans, 
if  they  have  any,  will  be  ashamed  of  it.  Men  are  often 
hurt  by  a  mean  action  who  are  not  startled  at  a  wicked  one, 
and  this  will  be  such  a  confession  of  inability,  such  a  decla- 
ration of  servile  thinking,  that  the  scandal  of  it  will  ruin  all 
their  hopes. 

In  short,  we  have  nothing  to  do  but  to  go  on  with  vigor 
and  determination.  The  enemy  is  yet  in  our  country.  They 
hold  New- York,  Charleston  and  Savannah,  and  the  very 
being  in  those  places  is  an  offence,  and  a  part  of  offensive 
war,  and  until  they  can  be  driven  from  them,  or  captured  in 
them,  it  would  be  folly  in  us  to  listen  to  an  idle  tale.  J 
take  it  for  granted  that  the  British  ministry  are  sinking 


THE   CRISIS.  161 

under  the  impossibility  of  carrying  on  the  war.  Let  them 
then  come  to  a  fair  and  open  peace  with  France,  Spain, 
Holland  and  America,  in  the  manner  that  she  ought  to  do ; 
but  until  then,  we  can  have  nothing  to  say  to  them. 

COMMON  SENSE. 

Philadelphia,  May  22,  1782. 


NUMBER  YTTT. 
TO  SIR  GUY  OARLETOK 

IT  is  the  nature  of  compassion  to  associate  with  mislor- 
tune ;  and  I  address  this  to  you  in  behalf  even  of  an  enemy, 
a  captain  in  the  British  service,  now  on  his  way  to  the  head- 
quarters of  the  American  army,  and  unfortunately  doomed 
to  death  for  a  crime  not  his  own.  A  sentence  so  extraordi- 
nary, an  execution  so  repugnant  to  every  human  sensation', 
ought  never  to  be  told  without  the  circumstances  which 
produced  it :  and  as  the  destined  victim  is  yet  in  existence, 
and  in  your  hands  rest  his  life  or  death,  I  shall  briefly  state 
the  case,  and  the  melancholy  consequence. 

Captain  Huddy,  of  the  Jersey  militia,  was  attacked  in  a 
small  fort  on  Tom's  River,  by  a  party  of  refugees  in  the 
British  pay  and  service,  was  made  prisoner,  together  with 
his  company,  carried  to  New- York  and  lodged  in  the  pro- 
vost of  that  city :  about  three  weeks  after  which,  he  was 
taken  out  of  the  provost  down  to  the  water-side,  put  into  a 
boat,  and  brought  again  upon  the  Jersey  shore,  and  there, 
contrary  to  the  practice  of  all  nations  but  savages,  was  hung 
up  on  a  tree,  and  left  hanging  till  found  by  our  people,  who 
took  him  down  and  buried  him. 

The  inhabitants  of  that  part  of  the  country  where  the 
murder  was  committed,  sent  a  deputation  to  general  Wash- 
ington with  a  full  and  certified  statement  of  the  fact.  Struck, 
as  every  human  breast  must  be,  with  such  brutish  outrage, 
and  determined  both  to  punish  and  prevent  it  for  the  future, 
the  general  represented  the  case  to  general  Clinton,  who 
then  commanded,  and  demanded  that  the  refugee  officer 
who  ordered  and  attended  the  execution,  and  whose  name  is 
Lippincut,  should  be  delivered  up  as  a  murderer ;  and  in 
case  of  refusal,  that  the  person  of  some  British  officer  should 


162  THE   CRISIS. 

Buffer  in  his  stead.  The  demand,  though  noc  refused, 
not  been  complied  with ;  and  the  melancholy  lot  (not  by  se- 
lection, but  by  casting  lots)  has  fallen  upon  captain  Asgill, 
of  the  guards,  who,  as  I  have  already  mentioned,  is  on  his 
way  from  Lancaster  to  camp,  a  martyr  to  the  general  wick- 
edness of  the  cause  he  engaged  in,  and  the  ingratitude  of 
those  whom  he  served. 

The  first  reflection  which  arises  on  this  black  business  is, 
what  sort  of  men  must  Englishmen  be,  and  what  sort  of 
order  and  discipline  do  they  preserve  in  their  army,  when 
in  the  immediate  place  of  their  head-quarters,  and  under 
the  eye  and  nose  of  their  commander-in-chief,  a  prisoner 
can  be  taken  at  pleasure  from  his  confinement,  and  his  death 
made  a  matter  of  sport. 

The  history  of  the  most  savage  Indians  does  not  produce 
instances  exactly  of  this  kind.  They,  at  least,  have  a  for- 
mality in  their  punishments.  With  them  it  is  the  horrid- 
ness  of  revenge,  but  with  your  army  it  is  a  still  greater 
crime,  the  horridness  of  diversion. 

The  British  gen'erals,  who  have  succeeded  each  other,  from 
the  time  of  general  Gage  to  yourself,  have  all  affected  to 
speak  in  language  that  they  have  no  right  to.  In  their  pro- 
clamations, their  addresses,  their  letters  to  general  Washing- 
ton, and  their  supplications  to  congress  (for  they  deserve  no 
other  name)  they  talk  of  British  honor,  British  generosity,  and 
British  clemency,  as  if  those  things  were  matters  of  fact ; 
whereas,  we  whose  eyes  are  open,  who  speak  the  same  lan- 
guage with  yourselves,  many  of  whom  were  bom  on  the 
same  spot  with  you,  and  who  can  no  more  be  mistaken  in 
your  words  than  in  your  actions,  can  declare  to  all  the 
world,  that  so  far  as  our  knowledge  goes,  there  is  not  a  more 
detestable  character,  nor  a  meaner  or  more  barbarous  enemy, 
than  the  present  British  one.  With  us,  you  have  forfeited 
all  pretensions  to  reputation,  and  it  is  only  holding  you  like 
a  wild  beast,  afraid  of  your  keepers,  that  you  can  be  made 
manageable.  But  to  return  to  the  point  in  question. 

Though  I  can  think  no  man  innocent  who  has  lent  his 
hand  to  destroy  the  country  which  he  did  not  plant,  and  to 
ruin  those  that  he  could  not  enslave,  yet,  abstracted  from  all 
ideas  of  right  and  wrong  on  the  original  question,  captain 
Asgill,  in  the  present  case,  is  not  the  guilty  man.  The 
villain  and  the  victim  are  here  separated  characters.  You 
hold  the  one  and  we  the  other.  You  disown,  or  affect  to 
diaown  and  reprobate  the  conduct  of  Lippincut,  yet  you  give 


THE   CRISIS.  163 

him  a  sanctuary ;  and  by  so  doing  you  as  effectually  become 
the  executioner  of  AsgiU,  as  if  you  had  put  the  rope  on  his 
neck,  and  dismissed  him  from  the  world.  Whatever  your 
feelings  on  this  interesting  occasion  may  be  are  best  known  to 
yourself.  Within  the  grave  of  our  own  mind  lies  buried  the 
fate  of  Asgill.  He  becomes  the  corpse  of  your  will,  or  the 
survivor  of  your  justice.  Deliver  up  the  one,  and  you  save 
the  other ;  withhold  the  one,  and  the  other  dies  by  your 
choice. 

On  our  part  the  case  is  exceeding  plain ;  cm  officer  has 
been  taken  from  his  confinement  and  murdered^  and  the  mur- 
derer is  within  your  lines.  Your  army  has  been  guilty  of  a 
thousand  instances  of  equal  cruelty,  but  they  nave  been 
rendered  equivocal,  and  sneltered  from  personal  detection. 
Here  the  crime  is  fixed ;  and  is  one  of  those  extraordinary 
cases  which  can  be  neither  denied  nor  palliated,  and  to  which 
the  custom  of  war  does  not  apply ;  for  it  never  could  be 
supposed  that  such  a  brutal  outrage  would  ever  be  com- 
mitted. It  is  an  original  in  the  history  of  civilized  barba- 
rians, and  is  truly  British. 

On  your  part  you  are  accountable  to  us  for  the  personal 
safety  of  the  prisoners  within  your  walls.  Here  can  be  no 
mistake ;  they  can  neither  be  spies  nor  suspected  as  such ; 
vour  security  is  not  endangered,  nor  your  operations  sub- 
jected to  miscarriage,  by  men  immured  within  a  dungeon. 
They  differ  in  every  circumstance  from  men  in  the  field,  and 
leave  no  pretence  tor  severity  of  punishment.  But  if  to  the 
dismal  condition  of  captivity  with  you,  must  be  added  the 
constant  apprehensions  of  death ;  if  to  be  imprisoned  is  sr 
nearly  to  be  entombed ;  and,  if  after  all,  the  murderers  ara 
to  be  protected,  and  thereby  the  crime  encouraged,  wherein 
do  you  differ  from  Indians,  either  in  conduct  or  character  \ 

We  can  have  no  idea  of  your  honor,  or  your  justice,  in 
any  future  transaction,  of  what  nature  it  may  be,  while  you 
shelter  within  your  lines  an  outrageous  murderer,  and  sacri- 
fice in  his  stead  an  officer  of  your  own.  If  you  have  no 
regard  to  us,  at  least  spare  the  blood  which  it  is  youi  duty 
to  save.  Whether  the  punishment  will  be  greater  on  him, 
who,  in  this  case,  innocently  dies,  or  on  niib  whom  »aii 
necessity  fcrces  to  retaliate,  is,  in  the  nicety  of  sensation,  an 
undecided  question.  It  rests 'with  you  to  prevent  the  suf- 
ferings of  both.  You  have  nothing  to  do  but  to  give  up  the 
murderer,  and  the  matter  ends. 

Ba'.  to  protect  him,  be  he  who  he  may,  is  to  patronise  hiB 


164  THE   CRISIS. 

crime,  and  to  trifle  it  off  by  frivolous  and  unmeaning  in 
quiries,  is  to  promote  it.  There  is  no  declaration  you  can 
make  nor  promise  you  can  give  that  will  obtain  credit.  It 
is  the  man  and  not  the  apology  that  is  demanded. 

You  see  yourself  pressed  on  all  sides  to  spare  the  life  of 
your  own  officer,  for  die  he  will  if  you  withhold  justice.  The 
murder  of  captain  Huddy  is  an  offence  not  to  be  borne  with, 
and  there  is  no  security  with  which  we  can  have,  that  such 
actions  or  similar  ones  shall  not  be  repeated,  but  by  making 
the  punishment  fall  upon  yourselves.  To  destroy  the  last 
security  of  captivity,  and  to  take  the  unarmed,  the  unresist- 
ing prisoner  to  private  and  sportive  execution,  is  carrying 
barbarity  too  high  for  silence.  The  evil  must  be  put  an 
end  to ;  and  the  choice  of  persons  rests  with  you.  But  if 
your  Attachment  to  the  guilty  is  stronger  than  to  the  inno- 
cent, you  invent  a  crime  that  must  destroy  your  character, 
and  if  the  cause  of  your  king  needs  to  be  so  supported,  for 
ever  cease,  sir,  to  torture  our  remembrance  with  the 
wretched  phrases  of  British  honor,  British  generosity,  and 
British  clemency. 

From  this  melancholy  circumstance,  learn,  sir,  a  lesson  of 
morality.  The  refugees  are  men  whom  your  predecessors 
have  instructed  in  wickedness,  the  better  to  fit  them  to  their 
master's  purpose.  To  make  them  useful,  they  have  made 
them  vile,  and  the  consequence  of  their  tutored  villainy  is 
now  descending  on  the  heads  of  their  encouragers.  They 
have  been  trained  like  hounds  to  the  scent  of  blood,  and 
cherished  in  every  species  of  dissolute  barbarity.  Their 
ideas  of  right  and  wrong  are  worn  away  in  the  constant 
habitude,  of  repeated  infamy,  till,  like  men  practised  in 
execution,  they  feel  not  the  value  of  another's  life. 

The  task  before  you,  though  painful,  is  not  difficult ;  give 
up  the  murderer,  and  save  your  officer,  as  the  first  outset  of 
necessary  reformation. 

COMMON 

Philadelphia,  May  31,  1782. 


THE   CRISIS.  165 

NUMBER    XIV. 
TO  THE  EARL  OF  SHELBTJRNE. 

Mr  LORD, — A  speech,  which  has  been  printed  in  seveial 
of  the  British  and  New- York  newspapers,  as  coming  from 
your  lordship,  in  answer  to  one  from  the  duke  of  Kichmond, 
of  the  10th  of  July  last,  contains  expressions  and  opinions 
so  new  and  singular,  and  so  enveloped  in  mysterious  reason- 
ing, that  I  address  this  publication  to  you,  for  the  purpose 
of  giving  them  a  free  and  candid  examination.  The  speech 
that  I  allude  to  is  in  these  words  : 

"His  lordship  said,  it  had  been  mentioned  in  another 
place,  that  he  had  been  guilty  of  inconsistency.  To  clear 
himself  of  this,  he  asserted  that  he  still  held  the  same 
principles  in  respect  to  American  independence  which 
he  at  first  imbibed.  He  had  been,  and  yet  was  of  opinion, 
whenever  the  parliament  of  Great  Britain  acknowledges  that 
point,  the  sun  of  England's  glory  is  set  ibrever.  Such  were 
the  sentiments  he  possessed  on  a  former  day,  and  such  the 
sentiments  he  continued  to  hold  at  this  hour.  It  was  the 
opinion  of  lord  Chatham,  as  well  as  many  other  able  states- 
men. Other  noble  lords,  however,  think  differently ;  and  as 
the  majority  of  the  cabinet  support  them,  he  acquiesced  in 
the  measure,  dissenting  from  the  idea ;  and  the  point  is  set- 
tled for  bringing  the  matter  into  the  full  discussion  of  par- 
liament, where  it  will  be  candidly,  fairly,  and  impartially 
debated.  The  independence  of  Ajnerica  would  end  in  the 
ruin  of  England  ;  and  that  a  peace  patched  up  with  France, 
would  give  that  proud  enemy  the  means  of  vet  trampling  on 
this  country.  The  sun  of  England's  glory  he  wished  not  to 
see  set  forever;  he  looked  for  a  spark  at  least  to  be  left, 
which  might  in  time  light  us  up  to  a  new  day.  But  if  inde- 
pendence was  to  be  granted,  if  parliament  deemed  that 
measure  prudent,  he  foresaw,  in  his  own  mind,  that  England 
was  undone.  He  wished  to  God  that  he  had  been  deputed 
to  congress,  that  he  might  plead  the  cause  of  that  country 
as  wefl  us  of  this,  and  that  he  might  exercise  whatever 
powers  h^  possessed  as  an  orator,  to  save  both  from  ruin,  in 
a  conviction  to  congress,  that,  if  their  independence  was 
»igned,  their  liberties  were  gone  forever. 


166  THE   CRISIS. 

"  Peace,  his  lordship  added,  was  a  desirable  object,  but  it 
must  be  an  honorable  peace,  and  not  an  humiliating  one, 
dictated  by  France,  or  insisted  on  by  America.  It  was  very 
true,  that  this  kingdom  was  net  in  a  flourishing  state,  it  was 
impoverished  by  war.  But  if  we  were  not  rich,  it  was  evi- 
dent that  France  was  poor.  If  we  were  straitened  in  our 
finances,  the  enemy  were  exhausted  in  tjieir  resources.  This 
was  a  great  empire ;  it  abounded  with  brave  men,  who  were 
able  and  willing  to  fight  in  a  common  cause ;  the  language 
of  humiliation  should  not,  therefore,  be  the  language  of 
Great  Britain.  His  lordship  said,  that  he  was  not  afraid  nor 
ashamed  of  those  expressions  going  to  America.  There 
were  numbers,  great  numbers  there,  who  were  of  the  same 
way  of  thinking,  in  respect  to  that  country  being  dependant 
on  this,  and  who,  with  his  lordship,  perceived  rum  and  inde- 
pendence linked  together." 

Thus  far  the  speech  ;  on  which  I  remark — That  his  lord- 
ship is  a  total  stranger  to  the  mind  and  sentiments  of  Ame- 
rica ;  that  he  has  wrapped  himself  up  in  fond  delusion,  that 
something  less  than  independence  may,  under  his  adminis- 
tration, be  accepted  ;  and  he  wishes  himself  sent  to  congress, 
to  prove  the  most  extraordinary  of  all  doctrines,  which  is, 
that  independence,  the  sublimest  of  all  human  conditions,  is 
loss  of  liberty. 

In  answer  to  which  we  may  say,  that  in  order  to  know 
what  the  contrary  word  dependance  means,  we  have  only  to 
look  back  to  those  years  of  severe  humiliation,  when  the 
mildest  of  all  petitions  could  obtain  no  other  notice  than  the 
haughtiest  of  all  insults ;  and  when  the  base  terms  of  uncon- 
ditional submission  were  demanded,  or  undistmguishable  de- 
struction threatened.  It  is  nothing  to  us  that  the  ministry 
have  been  changed,  for  they  may  be  changed  again.  Th^ 
guilt  of  a  government  is  the  crime  of  a  whole  country ;  ana 
the  nation  that  can,  though  but  for  a  moment,  think  and  act 
as  England  has  done,  can  never  afterwards  be  believed  or 
trusted.  There  are  cases  in  which  it  is  as  impossible  to  re- 
store character  to  life,  as  it  is  to  recover  the  dead.  It  is  a 
phenix  that  can  expire  but  once,  and  from  whose  ashes  there 
is  no  resurrection.  Some  offences  are  of  such  a  slight  com- 
position, that  they  reach  no  further  than  the  temper,  and  are 
created  or  cured  by  a  thought.  But  the  sin  of  England  has 
struck  the  heart  of  America,  and  nature  has  not  left  in  our 
power  to  say  we  can  forgive. 

Your  lordship  wishes  for  an  opportunity  to  plead  before 


THE   CRISIS.  167 

congress  the  cause  of  England  and  America,  and  to  save,  as 
you  say,  both  from  ruin. 

That  the  country,  which,  for  more  than  seven  years  has 
sought  our  destruction,  should  now  cringe  to  solicit  our  pro- 
tection, is  adding  the  wretchedness  of  disgrace  to  the  misery 
of  disappointment ;  and  if  England  has  the  least  spark  of 
supposed  honor  left,  Jhat  spark  must  be  darkened  by  asking, 
and  extinguished  by  receiving,  the  smallest  favor  from 
America  ;  for  the  criminal  who  owes  his  life  to  the  ^race  and 
mercy  of  the  injured,  is  more  executed  by  the  living,  than 
he  who  dies. 

But  a  thousandpleadings,  even  from  your  lordship,  can 
have  no  effect.  Honor,  interest,  and  every  sensation  of  the 
heart,  would  plead  against  you.  We  are  a  people  who  think 
not  as  you  think ;  and  what  is  equally  true,  vou  cannot  feel 
as  we  reel.  The  situation  of  the  two  countries  are  exceed- 
ingly different.  Ours  has  been  the  seat  of  war ;  yours  has 
seen  nothing  of  it.  The  most  wanton  destruction  has  been 
committed  in  our  sight ;  the  most  insolent  barbarity  has  been 
acted  on  our  feelings.  We  can  look  round  and  see  the  re- 
mains of  burnt  and  destroyed  houses,  once  the  fair  fruit  of 
hard  industry,  and  now  the  striking  monuments  of  British 
brutality.  We  walk  over  the  dead  whom  we  loved,  in  every 
part  of  America,  and  remember  by  whom  they  fell.  There 
is  scarcely  a  village  but  brings  to  life  some  melancholy 
thought,  and  reminds  us  of  what  we  have  suffered,  and  of 
those  we  have  lost  by  the  inhumanity  of  Britain.  A  thou- 
sand images  arise  to  us,  which,  from  situation,  you  cannot 
see,  and  are  accompanied  by  as  many  ideas  which  you  can- 
not know ;  and  therefore  your  supposed  system  of  reasoning 
would  apply  to  nothing,  and  all  your  expectations  die  of 
themselves. 

The  question  whether  England  shall  accede  to  the  inde- 
pendence of  America,  and  which  your  lordship  says  is  to 
undergo  a  parliamentary  discussion,  is  so  very  simple, 
and  composed  of  so  few  cases,  that  it  scarcely  needs  a 
debate. 

It  is  the  only  way  out  of  an  expensive  and  ruinous  war, 
which  has  no  object,  and  without  which  acknowledgment 
there  can  be  no  peace. 

But  your  lordship  says,  the  sun  of  Great  Britain  will  set 
whenever  she  acknowledges  the  independence  of  America. — 
Whereas  the  metaphor  would  have  been  strictly  just,  to 
Have  left  the  sun  "vholly  out  of  the  figure,  and  have 


'.68  THE   OBI  SIB. 

ascribed  her  not  acknowledging  it  to  the  influence  of  the 
moon. 

But  the  expression,  if  true,  is  the  greatest  confession  of 
disgrace  that  could  be  made,  and  furnishes  America  with 
the  highest  notions  of  sovereign  independent  importance. 
Mr.  Wedderburne,  about  the  year  1776,  made  use  of  an 
idea  of  much  the  same  kind, — Helvnguish  America !  says 
he —  What  is  it  but  to  desire  a  giant  to  shrink  spontaneously 
into  a  dwarf. 

Alas !  are  those  people  who  call  themselves  Englishmen, 
of  so  little  internal  consequence,  that  when  America  is  gone, 
or  shuts  her  eyes  upon  them,  their  sun  is  set,  they  can  shine 
no  more,  but  grope  about  in  obscurity,  and  contract  into 
insignificant  animals  ?  Was  America,  then,  the  giant  of  the 
empire,  and  England  only  her  dwarf  in  waiting  ?  Is  the 
case  so  strangely  altered,  that  those  who  once  thought  we 
could  not  live  without  them,  are  now  brought  to  declare 
that  they  cannot  exist  without  us  ?  Will  thev  tell  to  the 
world,  and  that  from  their  first  minister  01  state,  that 
America  is  their  all  in  all ;  that  it  is  by  her  importance  only 
that  they  can  live,  and  breathe,  and  have  a  being  ?  Will 
they,  who  long  since  threatened  to  bring  us  to  their  feet, 
uow  themselves  at  ours,  and  own  that  without  us  they  are 
aot  a  nation  ?  Are  they  become  so  unqualified  to  debate  on 
independence,  that  they  have  lost  all  idea  of  it  themselves, 
and  are  calling  to  the  rocks  and  mountains  of  America  to 
cover  their  insignificance?  Or,  if  America  is  lost,  is  it 
manly  to  sob  over  it  like  a  child  for  its  rattle,  and  invite  the 
Daughter  of  the  world  by  declarations  of  disgrace  ?  Surely, 
a  more  consistent  line  of  conduct  would  be  to  bear  it  without 
complaint ;  and  to  show  that  England,  without  America, 
can  preserve  her  independence,  and  a  suitable  rank  with 
other  European  powers.  You  were  not  contented  while  you 
had  her,  and  to  weep  for  her  now  is  childish. 

But  lord  Shelburne  thinks  something  may  yet  be  done. 
What  that  something  is,  or  how  it  is  to  oe  accomplished,  is 
a  matter  in  obscurity.  By  arms  there  is  no  hope.  The 
experience  of  nearly  eight  years,  with  the  expense  of  an 
hundred  million  pounds  sterling,  and  the  loss  of  two  armies, 
must  positively  decide  that  point.  Besides,  the  British  have 
lost  their  interest  in  America  with  the  disaffected.  Every 
i/art  of  it  has  been  tried.  There  is  no  new  scene  left  for 
delusion :  and  the  thousands  who  have  been  ruined  by  ad« 
hering  to  them,  and  have  no'v  to  qirt  the  settlements  whict 


THE   CRISIS.  169 

they  had  acquired,  and  be  conveyed  like  transports  to  culti- 
vate the  deserts  of  Augustine  and  Nova-Scotia,  has  put  an 
end  to  all  further  expectations  of  aid. 

If  you  cast  your  eyes  on  the  people  of  England,  what  have 
they  to  console  themselves  with  for  the  minions  expended  ? 
Or,  what  encouragement  is  there  left  to  continue  throwing 
good  money  after  bad  ?  America  can  carry  on  the  war  for 
ten  years  longer,  and  all  the  charges  of  government  included, 
for  less  than  you  can  defray  the  charges  of  war  and  govern- 
ment for  one  year.  And  I,  who  know  both  countries,  know 
well,  that  the  people  of  America  can  afford  to  pay  their 
share  of  the  expense  much  better  than  the  people  of  Eng- 
land can.  Besides,  it  is  their  own  estates  and  property,  their 
own  rights,  liberties  and  government,  that  they  are  defend- 
ing ;  and  were  they  not  to  do  it,  they  would  deserve  to  lose 
all,  and  none  would  pity  them.  The  fault  would  be  their 
own,  and  their  punishment  just. 

The  British  army  in  America  care  not  how  long  the  war 
lasts.  They  enjoy  an  easy  and  indolent  life.  They  fatten 
on  the  follv  of  one  country  and  the  spoils  of  another ;  and, 
between  their  plunder  and  their  pay,  may  go  home  rich. 
But  the  case  is  very  different  with  the  laboring  farmer,  the 
working  tradesman,  and  the  necessitous  poor  in  England, 
the  sweat  of  whose  brow  goes  day  after  day  to  feed,  in 
prodigality  and  sloth,  the  army  that  is  robbing  both  them 


and  us.  Kemoved  from  the  eye  of  that  country  that  sup- 
ports them,  and  distant  from  tne  government  that  employs 
them,  they  cut  and  carve  for  themselves,  and  there  is  none 
to  call  them  to  account. 

But  England  will  be  ruined,  says  lord  Shelburne,  if 
America  is  independent. 

Then,  I  say,  is  England  already  ruined,  for  America  is 
already  independent :  and  if  lord  Shelburne  will  not  allow 
this,  he  immediately  denies  the  fact  which  he  infers.  Besides, 
to  make  England  the  mere  creature  of  America,  is  paying 
too  great  a  compliment  to  us,  and  too  little  to  himself. 

But  the  declaration  is  a  rhapsody  of  inconsistency.  For 
to  say,  as  lord  Shelburne  has  numberless  times  said,  that  the 
war  against  America  is  ruinous,  and  yet  to  continue  the 
prosecution  of  that  ruinous  war  for  the  purpose  of  avoiding 
ruin,  is  a  language  which  cannot  be  understood.  Neither  is 
it  possible  to  see  how  the  independence  of  America  is  to 
accomplish  the  ruin  of  England  after  the  war  is  over,  and 
yet  uot  affect  it  before.  America  cannot  be  more  independ- 


170  THE   CEI8IS. 

ent  of  her,  nor  a  greater  enemy  to  her,  hereafter  than  she 
now  is  ;  nor  can  England  derive  less  advantages  from  her 
than  at  present :  why  then  is  ruin  to  follow  in  the  best  state 
of  the  case,  and  not  in  the  worst  ?  And  if  not  in  the  worst, 
why  is  it  to  follow  at  all  ? 

That  a  nation  is  to  be  ruined  by  peace  and  commerce,  and 
fourteen  or  fifteen  millions  a-year  less  expenses  than  before, 
is  a  new  doctrine  in  politics.  We  have  heard  much  clamor 
of  national  savings  and  economy  ;  but  surely  the  true 
economy  would  be,  to  save  the  whole  charge  of  a  silly,  foolish, 
and  headstrong  war ;  because,  compared  with  this,  all  other 
retrenchments  are  baubles  and  trifles. 

But  is  it  possible  that  lord  Shelburne  can  be  serious  in 
supposing  that  the  least  advantage  can  be  obtained  by  arms, 
or  that  any  advantage  can  be  equal  to  the  expense  or  the 
danger  of  attempting  it  ?  Will  not  the  capture  of  one  army 
after  another  satisfy  him,  must  all  become  prisoners  ?  Must 
England  ever  be  the  sport  of  hope,  and  the  victim  of  delu- 
sion ?  Sometimes  our  currency  was  to  fail ;  another  time  our 
army  was  to  disband  ;  then  whole  provinces  were  to  revolt. 
Such  a  general  said  this  and  that ;  another  wrote  so  and  so ; 
lord  Chatham  was  of  this  opinion ;  and  lord  somebody  else 
of  another.  To-day  20,000  Russians  and  20  Russian  ships 
of  the  line  were  to  come  ;  to-morrow  the  empress  was  abused 
without  mercy  or  decency.  Then  the  emperor  of  Germany 
was  to  be  bribed  with  a  million  of  money,  and  the  king  of 
Prussia  was  to  do  wonderful  things.  At  one  time  it  was, 
Lo  here  !  and  then  it  was,  Lo  there  !  Sometimes  this  power, 
and  sometimes  that  power,  was  to  engage  in  the  war, 
just  as  if  the  whole  world  was  as  mad  and  foolish  as 
Britain.  And  thus,  from  year  to  year,  has  every  straw  been 
catched  at,  and  every  Will-with-a-wisp  led  them  a  new 
<?ance. 

This  year  a  still  newer  folly  is  to  take  place.  Lord  Shel- 
burne wishes  to  be  sent  to  congress,  and  he  thinks  that  some- 
thing may  be  done. 

Are  not  the  repeated  declarations  of  congress,  and  which 
all  America  supports,  that  they  will  not  even  hear  any  pro- 
posals whatever,  until  the  unconditional  and  unequivocal 
independence  of  America  is  recognised  ;  are  not,  I  say,  these 
declarations  answer  enough  ? 

But  for  England  to  receive  any  thing  from  America  now, 
after  so  many  insults,  injuries  and  outrages,  acted  towards 
'\s,  would  show  such  a  spirit  of  meanness  in  her,  that  we 


THE   OBI8I8.  171 

conld  not  but  despise  her  for  accepting  it.  Ajid  so  far  from 
lord  Shelburne's  coming  here  to  solicit  it,  t  would  be  the 
greatest  disgrace  we  could  do  them  to  offer  it.  England 
would  appear  a  wretch  indeed,  at  this  time  of  day,  to  ask  or 
owe  any  thing  to  the  bounty  of  America.  Has  not  the 
name  of  Englishmen  blots  enough  upon  it,  without  invent- 
ing more  ?  Even  Lucifer  would  scorn  to  reign  in  heaven  by 
permission,  and  yet  an  Englishman  can  creep  for  only  an 
entrance  into  America.  Or,  has  a  land  of  liberty  so  many 
charms,  that  to  be  a  door-keeper  in  it  is  better  than  to  be 
an  English  minister  of  state  ? 

But  what  can  this  expected  something  be  ?  Or,  if  obtained, 
what  can  it  amount  to,  but  new  disgraces,  contentions 
and  quarrels  ?  The  people  of  America  have  for  years  accus- 
tomea  themselves  to  think  and  speak  so  freely  and  con- 
temptuously of  English  authority,  and  the  inveteracy  is  so 
deeply  rooted,  that  a  person  invested  with  any  authority 
from  that  country,  and  attempting  to  exercise  it  nere,  would 
have  the  life  of  a  toad  under  a  harrow.  They  would  look 
on  him  as  an  interloper,  to  whom  their  compassion  permit- 
ted a  residence.  He  would  be  no  more  than  the  Mungo  of 
a  farce ;  and  if  he  disliked  that,  he  must  set  off.  It  would  be  a 
station  of  degradation,  debased  by  our  pity,  and  despised  by 
our  pride,  and  would  place  England  in  a  more  contemptible 
situation  than  any  she  has  vet  been  in  during  the  war.  We 
have  too  high  an  opinion  of  ourselves,  ever  to  think  of  yield- 
ing again  the  least  obedience  to  outlandish  authority ;  and 
for  a  thousand  reasons,  England  would  be  the  last  country 
in  the  world  toyield  it  to.  She  has  been  treacherous,  and 
we  know  it.  Her  character  is  gone,  and  we  have  seen  the 
funeral. 

Surely  she  loves  to  fish  in  troubled  waters,  and  drink  the 
cup  of  contention,  or  she  would  not  now  think  of  mingling 
her  affairs  with  those  of  America.  It  would  be  like  a  fool- 
ish dotard  taking  to  his  arms  the  bride  that  despises  him,  or 
who  has  placed  on  his  head  the  ensigns  of  her  disgust.  It  is 
kissing  the  hand  that  boxes  his  ears,  and  proposing  to  renew 
the  exchange.  The  thought  is  as  servile  as  the  war  is  wicked, 
and  shows  the  last  scene  of  the  drama  to  be  as  inconsistent 
as  the  first. 

As  America  is  gone,  the  only  act  of  manhood  is  to  let  her 
<jo.  Your  lordship  had  no  hand  in  the  separation,  and  you 
will  gain  no  honor  by  temporising  politics.  Besides,  there 
is  something  so  exceedingly  whimsical,  unsteady,  and  even 


172  THE   CRISIS. 

insincere  in  the  present  conduct  of  England,  that  she  ex 
hibits  herself  in  the  most  dishonorable  colors. 

On  the  second  of  August  last,  general  Carleton  and  admi- 
ral Digby  wrote  to  general  Washington  in  these  words : 

"The  resolution  of  the  house  of  commons,  of  the  27th  of 
February  last,  has  been  placed  in  your  excellency's  hands, 
and  intimations  given  at  the  same  time  that  further  pacific 
measures  were  likely  to  follow.  Since  which,  until  the 
present  time,  we  have  had  no  direct  communications  with 
England ;  but  a  mail  is  now  arrived,  which  brings  us  very 
important  information.  We  are  acquainted,  sir,  by  authority, 
that  negotiations  for  a  general  peace  have  already  com- 
menced at  Paris,  and  that  Mr.  Grenville  is  invested  with  full 
powers  to  treat  with  all  the  parties  at  war,  and  is  now  at 
Paris  in  execution  of  his  commission.  And  we  are  further, 
sir,  made  acquainted,  that  his  majesty ',  in  order  to  remove 
any  obstacles  to  that  peace  which  he  so  ardently  wishes  to 
restore,  has  commanded  his  ministers  to  direct  Mr.  Grenville, 
that  tit  independence  of  the  Thirteen  United  Provinces, 
should  be  proposed  by  him  in  thejwst  instance,  instead  of 
making  it  a  condition  of  a  general  treaty." 

Now,  taking  your  present  measures  into  view,  and  com- 
paring them  with  the  declaration  in  this  letter,  pray  what  is 
the  word  of  your  king,  or  his  ministers,  or  the  parliament, 

food  for  ?  Must  we  not  look  upon  you  as  a  confederated 
ody  of  faithless,  treacherous  men,  whose  assurances  are 
fraud,  and  their  language  deceit?  What  opinion  can  we 
possibly  form  of  you,  but  that  you  are  a  lost,  abandoned, 
profligate  nation,  who  sport  even  with  your  own  character, 
and  are  to  be  held  by  nothing  but  the  bayonet  or  the  halter  ? 
To  say,  after  this,  that  the  sun  of  Q-reat  Britain  will  be  set 
whenever  she  acknowledges  the  independence  of  America, 
when  the  not  doing  it  is  the  unqualified  lie  of  government, 
can  be  no  other  than  the  language  of  ridicule,  the  jargon  of 
inconsistency.  There  were  thousands  in  America  who  pre 
dieted  the  delusion,  and  looked  upon  it  as  a  trick  of  treachery, , 
to  take  us  from  our  guard,  and  draw  off  our  attention  from 
the  only  system  of  finance,  by  which  we  can  be  called,  or 
deserve  to  be  called,  a  sovereign,  independent  people.  The 
fraud,  on  your  part,  might  be  worth  attempting,  but  the 
sacrifice  to  obtain  it  is  too  high. 

There  are  others  who  credited  the  assurance,  because  the^ 
thought  it  impossible  that  men  who  had  their  characters  to 
establish,  would  begin  it  with  a  lie.  The  prosecution  of  the 


THB  CRISIS.  ITS 

war  by  the  former  ministry  was  savage  and  horrid ;  since 
which  it  has  been  mean,  trickish,  and  delusive.  The  one  went 
greedily  into  the  passion  of  revenge,  the  other  into  the  subtle 
ties  of  low  contrivance ;  till,  between  the  crimes  of  both,  there 
is  scarcely  left  a  man  in  America,  be  he  whig  or  tory,  who 
does  not  despise  or  detest  the  conduct  of  Britain. 

The  management  of  lord  Shelburne,  whatever  may  be  his 
views,  is  a  caution  to  us,  and  must  be  to  the  world,  never 
to  regard  British  assurances.  A  perfidy  so  notorious  cannot 
be  hid.  It  stands  even  in  the  public  papers  of  New- York, 
with  the  names  of  Carleton  and  Digby  affixed  to  it.  It  is  a 
proclamation  that  the  king  of  England  is  not  to  be  believed ; 
that  the  spirit  of  lying  is  the  governing  principle  of  the 
ministry.  It  is  holding  up  the  character  of  the  house  of 
commons  to  public  infamy,  and  warning  all  men  not  to  credit 
them.  Such  are  the  consequences  which  lord  Shelburne's 
management  has  brought  upon  his  country. 

After  the  authorized  declarations  contained  in  Carleton 
and  Digby's  letter,  you  ought,  from  every  motive  of  honor, 
policy  and  prudence,  to  have  fulfilled  them,  whatever  might 
have  been  the  event.  It  was  the  least  atonement  that  you 
could  possibly  make  to  America,  and  the  greatest  kindness 
you  could  do  to  yourselves :  for  you  will  save  millions  by  a 
general  peace,  and  you  will  lose  as  many  by  continuing  the 
war. 

COMMON  SENSE. 

Philadelphia,  Oct.  29,  1782. 

P.  S.  The  manuscript  copy  of  this  letter  is  sent  your  lord 
ship,  by  the  way  of  our  head-quarters,  to  New- York,  inclos- 
ing a  late  pamphlet  of  mine,  addressed  to  the  abbe  Raynal, 
which  will  serve  to  give  your  lordship  some  idea  of  the  prin- 
ciples and  sentiments  of  America. 

0.  S. 


NUMBER    XV. 

"  THE  times  that  tried  men's  souls,"  *  are  over — and  the 
greatest  and  completest  revolution  the  world  ever  knew, 
gloriously  and  happily  accomplished. 

*  "  These  are  the  times  that  try  men's  souls."     The  Crisis  No.  L  published 
December,  1776. 


174  THE   CRISIS. 

But  to  pass  from  the  extremes  of  danger  to  safety — from 
the  tumult  of  war  to  the  tranquillity  of  peace,  though  sweet 
in1  contemplation,  requires  a  gradual  composure  of  the  sensea 
to  receive  it.  Even  calmness  has  the  power  of  stunning 
when  it  opens  too  instantly  upon  us.  The  long  and  raging 
hurricane  that  should  cease  in  a  moment,  would  leave  us  in 
a  state  rather  of  wonder  than  enjoyment;  and  some 
moments  of  recollection  must  pass,  before  we  could  be  cap- 
able of  tasting  the  felicity  of  repose.  There  are  but  few  in- 
stances, in  which  the  mind  is  fitted  for  sudden  transitions  : 
it  takes  in  its  pleasures  by  reflection  and  comparison,  and 
those  must  have  time  to  act,  before  the  relish  for  new  scenes 
is  complete. 

In  the  present  case — the  mighty  magnitude  of  the  object 
— the  various  uncertainties  of  fate  it  has  undergone — the 
numerous  and  complicated  dangers  we  have  suffered  or 
escaped — the  eminence  we  now  stand  on,  and  the  vast  pros- 
pect before  us,  must  all  conspire  to  impress  us  with  contem- 
plation. 

To  see  it  in  our  power  to  make  a  world  happy — to  teach 
mankind  the  art  of  being  so — to  exhibit,  on  the  theatre  of 
the  universe,  a  character  hitherto  unknown — and  to  have, 
as  it  were,  a  new  creation  intrusted  to  our  hands,  are  honors 
that  command  reflection,  and  can  neither  be  too  highly  esti- 
mated, nor  too  gratefully  received. 

In  this  pause  then  of  recollection — while  the  storm  is 
ceasing,  and  the  long  agitated  mind  vibrating  to  a  rest,  let 
us  look  back  on  the  scenes  we  have  passed,  and  learn  from 
experience  what  is  yet  to  be  done. 

Kever,  I  say,  had  a  country  so  many  openings  to  happi- 
ness as  this.  Her  setting  out  in  life,  like  the  rising  of  a  fail 
morning,  was  unclouded  and  promising.  Her  cause  was 
good.  Her  principles  just  and  liberal.  Her  temper  serene 
and  firm.  Her  conduct  regulated  by  the  nicest  steps,  and 
every  thing  about  her  wore  the  mark  of  honor.  It  is  not 
every  country  (perhaps  there  is  not  another  in  the  world) 
that  can  boast  so  fair  an  origin.  Even  the  first  settlement 
of  America  corresponds  with  the  characrer  of  the  revolution. 
Rome,  once  the  proud  mistress  of  the  universe,  was  originally 
a  band  of  ruffians.  Plunder  and  rapine  made  her  rich,  and 
her  oppression  of  millions  made  her  great.  But  America 
need  never  be  ashamed  to  tell  her  birth,  nor  relate  the 
stages  by  which  she  rose  to  empire. 

The  remembrance,  then,  of  what  is  past,  if  it  operates 


THE   CRISIS.  175 

kL  htly,  must  inspire  her  with  the  most  laudable  of  all  am- 
bition, that  of  adding  to  the  fair  fame  she  began  with.  The 
world  has  seen  her  great  in  adversity.  Struggling,  without 
a  thought  of  yielding,  beneath  accumulated  difficulties. 
Bravely,  nay  proudly,  encountering  distress,  and  rising  in 
resolution  as  the  storm  increased.  All  this  is  justly  due  to 
her,  for  her  fortitude  has  merited  the  character.  Let,  then, 
the  world  see  that  she  can  bear  prosperity :  and  that  her 
honeot  virtue  in  time  of  peace,  is  equal  to  tne  bravest  virtue 
in  time  of  war. 

She  is  now  descending  to  the  scenes  of  quiet  and  do- 
mestic life.  Not  beneath  the  cypress  shade  of  disappoint- 
ment, but  to  enjoy  in  her  own  land,  and  under  her  own  vine, 
the  sweet  of  her  labors,  and  the  reward  of  her  toil. — In  this 
situation,  may  she  never  forget  that  a  fair  national  reputa- 
tion is  of  as  much  importance  as  independence.  That  it 
possesses  a  charm  that  wins  upon  the  world,  and  makes 
even  enemies  civil. — That  it  gives  a  dignity  which  is  often 
superior  to  power,  and  commands  reverence  where  pomp 
and  splendor  fail. 

It  would  be  a  circumstance  ever  to  be  lamented  and  never 
to  be  forgotten,  were  a  single  blot,  from  any  cause  what- 
ever, suffered  to  fall  on  a  revolution,  which  to  the  end  of 
time  must  be  an  honor  to  the  age  that  accomplished  it: 
and  which  has  contributed  more  to  enlighten  the  world, 
and  diffuse  a  spirit  of  freedom  and  liberality  among  man- 
kind, than  any  human  event  (if  this  may  be  called  one)  that 
ever  preceded  it. 

It  is  not  among  the  least  of  the  calamities  of  a  long  con- 
tinued war,  that  it  unhinges  the  mind  from  those  nice  sen- 
sations which  at  other  times  appear  so  amiable.  The  con- 
tinued spectacle  of  wo  blunts  the  finer  feelings,  and  the 
necessity  of  bearing  with  the  sight,  renders  it  familiar.  In 
like  manner,  are  many  of  the  moral  obligations  of  society 
weakened,  till  the  custom  of  acting  by  necessity  becomes 
an  apology,  wheie  it  is  truly  a  crime.  Yet  let  but  a 
nation  conceive  rightly  of  its  character,  and  it  will  be 
chastely  just  in  protecting  it.  None  never  began  with  a 
fairer  than  America,  and  none  can  be  under  a  greater  obliga- 
tion to  preserve  it. 

The  debt  which  America  has  contracted,  compared  with 
the  cause  she  has  gamed,  and  the  advantages  to  flow  from 
it,  ought  scarcely  to  bo  mentioned.  She  has  it  in  her  choice 
to  do,  and  to  live  as  ha^py  as  she  pleases.  The  world  is  'v 


176  THE  CRISIS. 

her  bauds.  She  has  no  foreign  power  to  monopolize  hw 
commerce,  perplex  her  legislation,  or  control  her  prosperity, 
fhe  struggle  is  over,  which  must  one  day  have  happened, 
and,  perhaps,  never  could  have  happened  at  a  better  time.* 
And  instead  of  a  domineering  master,  she  has  gained  an 
ally,  whose  exemplary  greatness,  and  universal  liberality, 
have  extorted  a  confession  even  from  her  enemies. 

With  the  blessings  of  peace,  independence,  and  an  uni- 
versal commerce,  the  states,  individually  and  collectively, 
will  have  leisure  and  opportunity  to  regulate  and  establish 
their  domestic  concerns,  and  to  put  it  beyond  the  power  of 
calumny  to  throw  the  least  reflection  on  their  honor.  Char- 
acter is  much  easier  kept  than  recovered,  and  that  man,  if 
any  such  there  be,  who,  from  sinister  views,  or  littleness  of 


*  That  the  revolution  began  at  the  exact  period  of  time  best  fitted  to  the 
purpose,  is  sufficiently  proved  by  the  event. — But  the  great  hinge  on  which 
the  whole  machine  turned,  is  the  Union  of  the  States  ;  and  this  union  was 
naturally  produced  by  the  inability  of  any  one  state  to  support  itself  against 
any  foreign  enemy  without  the  assistance  of  the  rest. 

Had  the  states  severally  been  less  able  than  they  were  when  the  war  began, 
their  united  strength  would  not  have  been  equal  to  the  undertaking,  and  they 
must  in  all  human  probability  have  failed. — And,  on  the  other  hand,  had  they 
severally  been  more  able,  they  might  not  have  seen,  or,  what  is  more,  might 
not  have  felt,  the  necessity  of  uniting :  and,  either  by  attempting  to  stand 
alone,  or  in  small  confederacies,  would  have  been  separately  conquered. 

Now,  as  we  cannot  see  a  time  (and  many  years  must  pass  away  before  it 
can  arrive)  when  the  strength  of  any  one  state,  or  several  united,  can  be  equal 
to  the  whole  of  the  present  United  States,  and  as  we  have  seen  the  extreme 
difficulty  of  collectively  prosecuting  the  war  to  a  successful  issue,  and  pre- 
serving our  national  importance  in  the  world,  therefore,  from  the  experience 
we  have  had,  and  the  knowledge  we  have  gained,  we  must,  unless  we  make  a 
waste  of  wisdom,  be  strongly  impressed  with  the  advantage,  as  well  as  the 
necessity  of  strengthening  that  happy  union  which  has  been  our  salvation, 
and  without  which  we  should  have  been  a  ruined  people. 

While  I  was  writing  this  note,  I  cast  my  eye  on  the  pamphlet,  Common 
Sense,  from  which  I  shall  make  an  extract,  as  it  exactly  applies  to  the  case. 
It  is  as  follows  : 

"  I  have  never  met  with  a  man,  either  in  England  or  America,  who  hath 
not  confessed  it  as  his  opinion  that  a  separation  between  the  countries  would 
*ake  place  one  time  or  other ;  and  there  is  no  instance  in  which  we  have 
shown  less  judgment,  than  in  endeavoring  to  describe,  what  we  call,  the  ripe- 
ness or  fitness  of  the  continent  for  independence. 

"As  all  men  allow  the  measure,  and  differ  only  in  their  opinion  of  the 
time,  let  us,  in  order  to  remove  mistakes,  take  a  general  survey  of  things,  and 
endeavor,  if  possible,  to  find  out  the  very  time.  But  we  need  not  to  go  far, 
the  inquiry  ceases  at  once,  for  the  time  has  found  us.  The  general  concur- 
rence, the  glorious  union  of  all  things  prove  the  fact. 

"  It  is  not  in  numbers,  but  in  a  union,  that  our  great  strength  lies.  The  con- 
tinent is  just  arrived  at  that  pitch  of  strength  in  which  no  single  colony  is  able 
to  support  itself,  and  the  whole,  when  united,  can  accomplish  the  matter ;  and 
either  raor*  cr  less  than  this,  might  be  fatal  in  its  effects." 


THE   CEI8I8.  177 

lends  unseen  his  hand  to  injure  it,  contrives  a  wound 
it  will  never  be  in  his  power  to  heal. 

As  we  have  established  an  inheritance  for  posterity,  let 
that  inheritance  descend,  with  every  mark  of  an  honorable 
conveyance.  The  little  it  will  cost,  compared  with  the 
worth  of  the  states,  the  greatness  of  the  object,  and  the  value 
of  national  character,  will  be  a  profitable  exchange. 

But  that  which  must  more  forcibly  strike  a  thoughtful, 
penetrating  mind,  and  which  includes  and  renders  easy  all 
inferior  concerns,  is  the  Union  of  the  States.  On  this  our 
great  national  character  depends.  It  is  this  which  must 
give  us  importance  abroad  and  security  at  home.  It  is 
tnrough  this  only,  that  we  are,  or  can  be  nationally  known 
in  the  world ;  it  is  the  flag  of  the  United  States  which  ren- 
ders our  ships  and  commerce  safe  on  the  seas,  or  in  a  foreign 
port.  Our  Mediterranean  passes  must  be  obtained  under 
the  same  style.  All  our  treaties,  whether  of  alliance,  peace 
or  commerce,  are  formed  under  the  sovereignty  of  the  United 
States,  and  Europe  knows  us  by  no  other  name  or  title. 

The  division  of  the  empire  into  states  is  for  our  own  con- 
venience, but  abroad  this  distinction  ceases.  The  affairs  of 
each  state  are  local.  They  can  go  no  further  than  to  itself. 
And  were  the  whole  worm  of  even  the  richest  of  them  ex- 
pended in  revenue,  it  would  not  be  sufficient  to  support  sove- 
reignty against  a  foreign  attack.  In  short,  we  have  no 
other  national  sovereignty  than  as  United  States.  It  would 
even  be  fatal  for  us  if  we  had — too  expensive  to  be  main- 
tained, and  impossible  to  be  supported.  Individuals,  or  in- 
dividual states,  may  call  themselves  what  they  please ;  but 
the  world,  and  especially  the  world  of  enemies,  is  not  to  be 
held  in  awe  by  the  whistling  of  a  name.  Sovereignty  must 
have  power  to  protect  all  the  parts  that  compose  and  consti- 
tute it ;  and  as  UNITED  STATES  we  are  equal  to  the  import- 
ance of  the  title,  but  otherwise  we  are  not.  Our  union,  well 
and  wisely  regulated  and  cemented,  is  the  cheapest  way  of 
being  great — the  easiest  way  of  being  powerful,  and  the 
happiest  invention  in  government  which  the  circumstances 
of  America  can  admit  of.  Because  it  collects  from  each 
state,  that  which,  by  being  inadequate,  can  be  of  no  use  to 
it,  am1  forms  an  aggregate  that  serves  for  all. 

The  elates  of  Holland  are  an  unfortunate  instance  of  the 
effects  01  ;ndividual  sovereignty.  Their  disjointed  condition 
exposes  then:  to  numerous  intrigues,  losses,  calamities  and 
enemies ;  ana  the  almost  Impossibility  of  bringing  theii 


178  THE   CRISIS. 

measures  to  a  decision,  and  that  decision  into  execution,  ia 
to  them,  and  would  be  to  us,  a  source  of  endless  misfortune. 

It  is  with  confederated  states  as  with  individuals  in  soci- 
ety ;  something  must  be  yielded  up  to  make  the  whole  secure. 
In  this  view  of  things  we  gain  by  what  we  give,  and  draw 
an  annual  interest  greater  than  the  capital. — I  ever  feel  my- 
self hurt  when  I  hear  the  union,  that  great  palladium  of  our 
liberty  and  safety,  the  least  irreverently  spoken  of.  It  is  the 
most  eacred  thing  in  the  constitution  of  America,  and  that 
which  every  man  should  be  most  proud  and  tender  of.  Our 
citizenship  in  the  United  States  is  our  national  character. 
Our  citizenship  in  any  particular  state  is  only  our  local  dis- 
tinction. By  the  latter  we  are  known  at  home,  by  the 
former  to  the  world.  Our  great  title  is  AMERICANS — our  in- 
ferior one  varies  with  the  place. 

So  far  as  my  endeavors  could  go,  they  have  all  been  di- 
rected to  conciliate  the  affections,  unite  the  interests,  and 
draw  and  keep  the  mind  of  the  country  together ;  and  the 
better  to  assist  in  this  foundation  work  of  the  revolution,  I 
have  avoided  all  places  of  profit  or  office,  either  in  the  state 
I  live  in,  or  in  the  United  States  ;  kept  myself  at  a  distance 
from  all  parties  and  party  connexions,  and  even  disregarded 
all  private  and  inferior  concerns :  and  when  we  take  into 
view  the  great  work  which  we  have  gone  through,  and  feel, 
as  we  ought  to  feel,  the  just  importance  of  it,  we  shall  then 
see,  that  the  little  wranglings  and  indecent  contentions  of 
personal  parley,  are  as  dishonorable  tf»  our  characters,  as 
they  are  injurious  to  our  repose. 

it  was  tne  cause  of  America  that  made  me  an  author. 
The  force  with  which  it  struck  my  mind,  and  the  dangerous 
condition  the  country  appeared  to  me  in,  by  courting  an 
impossible  and  an  unnatural  reconciliation  with  those  who 
were  determined  to  reduce  her,  instead  of  striking  out  into 
the  only  line  that  could  cement  and  save  her,  A  DECLAKATION 
OF  INDEPENDENCE,  made  it  impossible  for  me,  feeling  as  I  did, 
to  be  silent :  and  if,  in  the  course  of  more  than  seven  years, 
I  have  rendered  her  any  service,  I  have  likewise  added 
something  to  the  reputation  of  literature,  by  freely  and  dis- 
interestedly employing  it  in  the  great,  cause  of  mankind, 
and  showing  that  there  may  be  genius  without  prostitu- 
tion. 

Independence  always  appeared  to  me  practicable  and 
probable ;  provided  the  sentiment  of  the  country  could  be 
formed  and  b«ild  to  the  obiect :  and  there  is  no  instance  in 


THB   CRISIS.  179 

the  world,  where  a  people  BO  extended,  and  wedded  to 
former  habits  of  thinking,  and  under  such  a  variety  of  cir- 
cumstances, were  so  instantly  and  effectually  pervaded,  by 
a  turn  in  politics,  as  in  the  cade  of  independence,  and  who 
supported  their  opinion,  undiminished,  through  such  a 
succession  of  good  and  ill  fortune,  till  they  crowned  it  with 
success. 

But  as  the  scenes  of  war  are  closed,  and  every  man  pre- 
paring for  home  and  happier  times,  I  therefore  take  my 
leave  of  the  subject.  I  have  most  sincerely  followed  it  from 
beginning  to  end,  and  through  all  its  turns  and  windings  : 
and  whatever  country  I  may  hereafter  be  in,  I  shall  always 
feel  an  honest  pride  at  the  part  I  have  taken  and  acted,  and 
a  gratitude  to  nature  and  providence  for  putting  it  in  my 
power  to  be  of  some  use  to  mankind. 

COMMON  SENSE. 

Philadelphia,  April  19,  1788. 


NUMBER   XVI. 
TO  THE  PEOPLE  OF  AMERICA. 

.br  "  Rivington's  New-York  Gazette,"  of  December  6th,  is 
a  publication,  under  the  appearance  of  a  letter  from  Lon- 
don, dated  September  30th;  and  is  on  a  subject  which 
demands  the  attention  of  the  United  States. 

The  public  will  remember  that  a  treaty  of  commerce  be- 
tween the  United  States  and  England  was  set  on  foot  last 
spring,  and  that  until  the  said  treaty  could  be  completed,  a 
bill  w*s  brought  into  the  British  parliament  by  the  then 
chancellor  of  the  exchequer,  Mr.  Pitt,  to  admit  and  legalize 
(as  the  case  then  required)  the  commerce  of  the  United 
States  into  the  British  ports  and  dominions.  But  neither 
the  one  nor  the  other  has  been  completed.  The  commercial 
treaty  is  either  broken  off,  or  remains  as  it  began  ;  and  the 
bill  in  parliament  has  been  thrown  aside.  And  in  lieu 
thereof,  a  selfish  system  of  English  politics  has  started  up, 
calculated  to  fetter  the  commerce  of  America,  by  engross- 
ing to  England  the  carrying  trade  of  the  American  produce 
to  the  West  India  islands. 


180  THE   CRISIS. 

Among  the  advocates  for  this  last  measure  is  lord  Shef- 
field, a  member  of  the  British  parliament,  who  has  published 
A  pamphlet  entitled  "  Observations  on  the  Commerce  of  the 
American  States."  The  pamphlet  has  two  objects ;  the  one 
is  to  allure  the  Americans  to  purchase  British  manufac- 
tures ;  and  the  other  to  spirit  up  the  British  parliament  to 
prohibit  the  citizens  of  the  United  States  from  trading  to 
the  West  India  islands. 

Viewed  in  this  light,  the  pamphlet,  though  in  some  parts 
dexterously  written,  is  an  absurdity.  It  offends,  in  the  very 
act  of  endeavoring  to  ingratiate ;  and  his  lordship  as  a  poli- 
tician, ought  not  to  have  suffered  the  two  objects  to  have 
appeared  together.  The  letter  alluded  to,  contains  extracts 
from  the  pamphlet,  with  high  encomiums  on  lord  Sheffield, 
for  laboriously  endeavoring  (as  the  letter  styles  it)  "to 
show  the  mighty  advantages  of  retaining  the  carrying  trade." 

Since  the  publication  of  this  pampnlet  in  England,  the 
commerce  of  the  United  States  to  the  West  Indies,  in 
American  vessels,  has  been  prohibited ;  and  all  intercourse, 
except  in  British  bottoms,  the  property  of,  and  navigated 
oy  British  subjects,  cut  off. 

That  a  country  has  a  right  to  be  as  foolish  as  it  pleases, 
has  been  proved  by  the  practice  of  England  for  many  years 
past :  in  ner  island  situation,  sequestered  from  the  world, 
she  forgets  that  her  whispers  are  heard  by  other  nations ; 
and  in  ner  plans  of  politics  and  commerce,  she  seems  not  to 
know,  that  other  votes  are  necessary  besides  her  own. 
America  would  be  equally  as  foolish  as  Britain,  were  she  to 
suffer  so  great  a  degradation  on  her  flag,  and  such  a  stroke 
on  the  freedom  of  her  commerce,  to  pass  without  a  balance. 

We  admit  the  right  of  any  nation  to  prohibit  the  com- 
merce of  another  into  its  own  dominions,  where  there  are  no 
treaties  to  the  contrary ;  but  as  this  right  belongs  to  one 
side  as  well  as  the  other,  there  is  always  a  way  left  to  bring 
avarice  and  insolence  to  reason. 

But  the  ground  of  security  which  lord  Sheffield  has  chosen 
to  erect  his  policy  upon,  is  of  a  nature  which  ought,  and  I 
think  must,  awaken,  in  every  American,  a  just  and  strong 
sense  of  national  dignity.  Lord  Sheffield  appears  to  be 
sensible,  that  in  advising  the  British  nation  and  parliament 
to  engross  to  themselves  so  great  a  part  of  the  carrying 
trade  of  America,  he  is  attempting  a  measure  which  cannot 
succeed,  if  the  politics  of  the  United  States  be  properly 
directed  to  counteract  the  assumption. 


THE    CRISIS.  181 

But,  says  he,  in  his  pamphlet,  "  It  will  be  a  long  time 
before  the  American  states  can  be  brought  to  act  as  a  nation, 
neither  are  they  to  be  feared  as  such  by  us." 

What  is  this  more  or  less  than  to  tell  us,  that  while  we 
have  no  national  system  of  commerce,  the  British  will  govern 
our  trade  by  their  own  laws  and  proclamations  as  they 
please.  The  quotation  discloses  a  truth  too  serious  to  be 
overlooked,  and  too  mischievous  not  to  be  remedied. 

Among  other  circumstances  which  led  them  to  this  dis- 
covery, none  could  operate  so  effectually  as  the  injudicious, 
uncandid  and  indecent  opposition  made  by  sundry  persons 
in  a  certain  state,  to  the  recommendations  of  congress  last 
winter,  for  an  import  duty  of  five  per  cent.  It  could  not 
but  explain  to  the  British  a  weakness  in  the  national  power 
of  America,  and  encourage  them  to  attempt  restrictions  on 
her  trade,  which  otherwise  they  would  not  have  dared  to 
hazard.  Neither  is  there  any  state  in  the  union,  whose 
policy  was  more  misdirected  to  its  interest  than  the  state  I 
allude  to,  because  her  principal  support  is  the  carrying  trade, 
which  Britain,  induced  by  the  want  of  a  well-centred  power 
in  the  United  States  to  protect  and  secure,  is  now  attempt- 
ing to  take  away.  It  fortunately  happened  (and  to  no  state 
in  the  union  more  than  the  state  in  question)  that  the  termg 
of  peace  were  agreed  on  before  the  opposition  appeared, 
otherwise,  there  cannot  be  a  doubt,  that  if  the  same  idea  of 
the  diminished  authority  of  America  had  occurred  to  them 
at  that  time  as  has  occurred  to  them  since,  but  they  would 
have  made  the  same  grasp  at  the  fisheries,  as  tney  have 
done  at  the  carrying  trade. 

It  is  surprising  that  an  authority  which  can  be  supported 
with  so  much  ease,  and  so  little  expense,  and  capable  of 
*uch  extensive  advantages  to  the  country,  should  be  cavilled 
<it  by  those  whose  duty  it  is  to  watch  over  it,  and  whose 
existence  as  a  people  depends  upon  it.  But  this,  perhaps, 
will  ever  be  the  case,  till  some  misfortune  awakens  us  into 
reason,  and  the  instance  now  before  us  is  but  a  gentle  begin- 
ning of  what  America  must  expect,  unless  she  guards  ner 
union  with  nicer  care  and  stricter  honor.  United,  she  is 
formidable,  and  that  with  the  least  possible  charge  a  nation 
can  be  so :  separated,  she  is  a  medley  of  individual  nothings, 
subject  to  the  sport  of  foreign  nations. 

It  ia  very  probable  that  tne  ingenuity  of  commerce  may 
have  found  out  a  method  to  evade  and  supersede  the  inten- 
fj'/'m  of  thj  British,  in  interdicting  the  trade  with  the  TVest 


18JJ  THB   CRISIS. 

India  islands.  The  language  of  both  being  the  same,  ana 
their  customs  well  understood,  the  vessels  of  one  country 
may,  by  deception,  pass  for  those  of  another.  But  this  would 
be  a  practice  too  debasing  for  a  sovereign  people  to  stoop 
to,  and  too  profligate  not  to  be  discountenanced.  An  illicit 
trade,  under  any  shape  it  can  be  placed,  cannot  be  carried 
on  without  a  violation  of  truth.  America  is  now  sovereign 
and  independent,  and  ought  to  conduct  her  affairs  in  a  regu- 
lar style  of  character.  She  has  the  same  right  to  say  that  no 
British  vessel  shall  enter  her  ports,  or  that  no  British  manu- 
factures shall  be  imported,  but  in  American  bottoms,  the 
property  of,  and  navigated  by  American  subjects,  as  Britain 
has  to  say  the  same  thing  respecting  the  West  Indies.  Or 
she  may  lay  a  duty  of  ten,  fifteen,  or  twenty  shillings  per 
ton  (exclusive  of  other  duties)  on  every  British  vessel  coming 
from  any  port  of  the  "West  Indies,  where  she  is  not  permitted 
to  trade,  the  said  tonnage  to  continue  as  long  on  her  side  as 
the  prohibition  continues  on  the  other. 

But  it  is  only  by  acting  in  union,  that  the  usurpations  of 
foreign  nations  on  the  freedom  of  trade  can  be  counteracted, 
and  security  extended  to  the  commerce  of  America.  And 
when  we  view  a  flag,  which  to  the  eye  is  beautiful,  and  to 
contemplate  its  rise  and  origin  inspires  a  sensation  of  sublime 
delight,  our  national  honor  must  unite  with  our  interest  to 
prevent  injury  to  the  one,  or  insult  to  the  other. 

COMMON  SENSE. 

AW  York,  Lkcember  9,  1788. 


MTD    D»  THB  CBIEIft. 


RIGHTS   OF  MAN 


fO  MR  BURKE'S  ATTACK   ON  THI    FRENCH   WOLUTJflfc 
PART  I. 


GJ-KORG-EJ     W  .A.  S  H  I  N"  G^  T  O  1ST , 

PRESIDENT  OF  THE   UNITED   STATES  OF   AMERICA. 
'/ 

I  present  you  a  small  treatise  in  defence  of  those  principles  of  freedom  which  y ;«! 
«?     .ilary  virtue  hath  so  eminently  contributed  to  ostubl'sl'      T"  at  the  rights  of  man  uiaj 
become  as  universal  as  your  benevolence  can  wish,  and  that  you  may  snjoy  the  happiness  c '. 
toeing  'he  new  world  regenerate  the  old,  is  the  prayer  of 
Sir, 

Tour  much  obliged,  and 

Obedient  humble  sei  vant, 

THOMAS  PAINE 


RIGHTS   OF  MAN. 


PART   I. 

AMONG  the  incivilities  by  which  nations  or  individuals 
provoke  and  irritate  each  other,  Mr.  Burke's  pamphlet  on 
the  French  revolution  is  an  extraordinary  instance.  Neither 
the  people  of  France,  nor  the  national  assembly,  were 
troubling  themselves  about  the  affairs  of  England,  or  the 
English  parliament ;  and  why  Mr.  Burke  should  commence 
an  unprovoked  attack  upon  them,  both  in  parliament  and 
in  public,  is  a  conduct  that  cannot  be  pardoned  on  the  score 
of  manners,  nor  justified  on  that  of  policy. 

There  is  scarcely  an  epithet  of  abuse  to  be  found  in  the 
English  language,  with  which  Mr.  Burke  has  not  loaded  the 
French  nation  and  the  national  assembly.  Every  thing 
which  rancor,  prejudice,  ignorance  or  knowledge  could  sug- 

fest,  are  poured  forth  in  trie  copious  fury  of  near  four  hun- 
red  pages.  In  the  strain  and  on  the  plan  Mr.  Burke  was 
writing,  he  might  have  wrote  on  to  as  many  thousand. 
"When  the  tongue  or  the  pen  is  let  loose  in  a  phrenzy  of 
passion,  it  is  the  man,  and  not  the  subject  that  becomes 
exhausted. 

Hitherto  Mr.  Burke  has  been  mistaken  and  disappointed 
in  the  opinions  he  had  formed  on  the  affairs  of  France  ;  but 
such  is  the  ingenuity  of  his  hope,  or  the  malignancy  of  his 
despair,  that  it  furnishes  him  with  new  pretences  to  go  on. 
There  was  a  time  when  it  was  impossible  to  make  Mr. 
Burke  believe  there  would  be  any  revolution  in  France. 
His  opinion  then  was,  that  the  French  had  neither  spirit  to 
undertake  it,  nor  fortitude  to  support  it ;  and  now  that  therj 
is  one  he  seeks  an  escape  by  condemning  it. 

D 


6  EIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

Not  sufficiently  content  with  abusing  the  national  assem 
bly,  a  great  part  of  his  work  is  taken  up  with  abusing  Dr. 
Price  (one  of  the  best  hearted  men  that  exist)  and  the  two 
societies  in  England,  known  by  the  name  of  the  Revolution 
and  the  Constitutional  societies. 

Dr.  Price  had  preached  a  sermon  on  the  4th  of  Novem- 
ber, 1789,  being  the  anniversary  of  what  is  called  in  Eng- 
land the  revolution,  which  took  place  in  1688.  Mr.  Burke, 
speaking  of  this  sermon,  says,  "  the  political  divine  proceeds 
dogmatically  to  assert,  that,  by  the  principles  of  the  revolu- 
tion, the  people  of  England  have  acquired  three  fundamental 
rights . 

1st,  To  choose  our  own  governors. 

2d,  To  cashier  them  for  misconduct. 

3d,  To  frame  a  government  for  ourselves." 

Dr.  Price  does  not  say  that  the  right  to  do  these  things 
exists  in  this  or  in  that  person,  or  in  this  or  in  that  descrip- 
tion of  persons,  but  that  it  exists  in  the  whole — that  it  is  a 
right  resident  in  the  nation.  Mr.  Burke,  on  the  contrary, 
denies  that  such  a  right  exists  in  the  nation,  either  in  whole 
or  in  part,  or  that  it  exists  any  where ;  and  what  is  still 
more  strange  and  marvellous,  he  says,  that  "  the  people  of 
England  utterly  disclaim  such  right,  and  that  they  will 
resist  the  practical  assertion  of  it  with  their  lives  and  for- 
tunes." That  men  will  take  up  arms,  and  spend  their  lives 
and  fortunes  not  to  maintain  their  rights,  but  to  maintain 
that  they  have  not  rights,  is  an  entire  new  species  of  dis- 
covery, and  suited  to  the  paradoxical  genius  of  Mr.  Burke. 

The  method  which  Mr.  Burke  takes  to  prove  that  the 
people  of  England  have  no  such  rights,  and  that  such  rights 
do  not  exist  in  the  nation,  either  in  whole  or  in  part,  or  any 
where  at  all,  is  of  the  same  marvellous  and  monstrous  kind 
with  what  he  hab  already  said ;  for  his  arguments  are,  that 
the  persons,  or  the  generation  of  persons  in  whom  they  did 
exist,  are  dead,  and  with  them  the  right  is  dead  also.  To 
prove  this,  he  quotes  a  declaration  made  by  parliament 
about  an  hundred  years  ago,  to  William  and  Mary,  in  these 
words :  "  The  lords  spiritual  and  temporal,  and  commons, 
do,  in  the  name  of  the  people  aforesaid — (meaning  the  peo- 
pl<  of  England  then  living)  most  humbly  and  faithfully 
sih  nit  themselves,  their  heirs  and  posterity  FOR  EVEK." — He 
afe.  quotes  a  clause  of  another  act  of  parliament  made  in 
tin1  ame  reign,  the  terms  of  which,  he  says,  "  bind  us — 
(meaning  the  people  of  that  day) — our  heirs  and  our  po* 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN.  1 

verity,  to  them,  their  heirs  and  posterity,  to  the  end  of 
time." 

Mr.  Buike  considers  his  point  sufficiently  established  by 
producing  those  clauses,  which  he  enforces  by  saying  that 
they  exclude  the  right  of  the  nation  for  ever  /  and  not  yet 
content  with  making  such  declarations,  repeated  over  and 
over  again,  he  further  says,  "  that  if  the  people  of  England 
possessed  such  a  right  before  the  revolution  "  (which  he 
acknowledges  to  have  been  the  case,  not  only  in  England, 
but  throughout  Europe  at  an  early  period) "  yet  that  the  Eng- 
lish nation  did,  at  the  time  of  the  revolution,  most  solemnly 
renounce  and  abdicate  it,  for  themselves,  and  for  all  their 
posterity  for  ever" 

As  Mr.  Burke  occasionally  applies  the  poison  drawn  from 
his  horrid  principles  (if  it  is  not  a  profanation  to  call  them 
by  the  name  of  principles)  not  only  to  the  English  nation, 
but  to  the  Frencn  revolution  and  tne  national  assembly,  and 
charges  that  august,  illuminated  and  illuminating  body  of 
men  with  the  epithet  of  usurpers,  I  shall,  sans  ceremonie, 
place  another  system  of  principles  in  opposition  to  his. 

The  English  parliament  of  1688,  did  a  certain  thing,  which 
for  themselves  and  their  constituents,  they  had  a  right  to 
do,  and  which  appeared  right  should  be  done ;  but,  in  addi- 
tion to  this  right,  which  they  possessed  by  delegation,  they  set 
up  another  right  by  assumption^  that  of  binding  and  control- 
ling posterity  to  the  end  of  time.  The  case,  therefore,  divides 
itself  into  two  parts  ;  the  right  which  they  possessed  by  dele- 

fation,  and  the  right  which  they  set  up  by  assumption.  The 
rst  is  admitted  ;  but  with  respect  to  the  second,  I  reply  : — 
There  never  did,  nor  never  can  exist  a  parliament,  or  any 
description  of  men,  or  any  generation  of  men,  in  any  coun- 
try, possessed  of  the  right  or  the  power  of  binding  or  con- 
trolling posterity  to  the  "  end  of  time,"  or  of  commanding 
for  ever  how  tne  world  shall  be  governed,  or  who  shall 
govern  it ;  and  therefore  all  such  clauses,  acts,  or  declara- 
tions, by  which  the  makers  of  them  attempt  to  do  what  they 
Aave  neither  the  right  nor  the  power  to  do,  nor  the  power 
to  execute,  are  in  themselves  null  and  void.  Every  age  and 
generation  must  be  as  free  to  act  for  itself,  in  all  causes,  ap 
the  ages  and  generations  which  preceded  it.  The  vanity 
and  presumption  of  governing  beyond  the  grave,  is  the  most 
ridiculous  and  insolent  of  all  tyrannies.  Man  has  no  pro- 
perty in  man ;  neither  has  any  generation  a  property  in  the 
generations  which  are  to  follow.  The  parliament  or  the 


EIGHTS   OF   MAH. 

people  of  1688,  or  of  any  other  period,  had  no  more  right  to 
dispose  of  the  people  of  the  present  day,  or  to  bind  or  to 
control  them  in  any  shape  whatever,  than  the  parliament  or 
the  people  of  the  present  day  have  to  dispose  of,  bind  or 
control  those  who  are  to  live  an  hundred  or  a  thousand 
years  hence.  Every  generation  is  and  must  be  competent 
to  all  the  purposes  which  its  occasions  require.  It  is  the 
living  and  not  the  dead,  that  are  to  be  accommodated.  When 
man  ceases  to  be,  his  power  and  his  wants  cease  with  him : 
and  having  no  longer  any  participation  in  the  concerns  of 
this  world,  he  has  no  longer  any  authority  in  directing  who 
shall  be  its  governors,  or  how  its  government  shall  be 
organized,  or  now  administered. 

I  am  not  contending  for,  nor  against,  any  form  of  govern 
ment,  nor  for  nor  against  any  party,  here  or  elsewhere.  That 
which  a  whole  nation  chooses  to  do,  it  has  a  right  to  do. 
Mr.  Burke  denies  it.  Where  then  does  the  right  exist  ?  I 
am  contending  for  the  right  of  the  living  and  against  their 
being  willed  away,  and  controlled  and  contracted  for,  by 
the  manuscript-assumed  authority  of  the  dead ;  and  Mr. 
Burke  is  contending  for  the  authority  of  the  dead  over  the 
rights  and  freedom  of  the  living.  There  was  a  time  when 
kings  disposed  of  their  crowns  by  will  upon  their  death-beds, 
and  consigned  the  people  like  beasts  of  the  field,  to  what- 
ever successor  they  appointed.  This  is  now  so  exploded  as 
scarcely  to  be  remembered,  and  so  monstrous  as  hardly  to 
be  believed :  but  the  parliamentary  clauses  upon  which  Mr. 
Burke  builds  his  political  church,  are  of  the  same  nature. 

The  laws  of  every  country  must  be  analogous  to  some 
common  principle.  In  England,  no  parent  or  master,  nor 
all  the  authority  of  parliament,  omnipotent  as  it  has  called 
itself,  can  bind  or  control  the  personal  freedom  even  of  an 
individual  beyond  the  age  of  twenty-one  years :  on  what 
ground  of  right  then  could  the  parliament  of  1688,  or  any 
other  parliament,  bind  all  posterity  for  ever? 

Those  who  have  quitted  the  world,  and  those  who  are  not 
arrived  yet  in  it,  are  as  remote  from  each  other  as  the  utmost 
stretch  of  mortal  imagination  can  conceive :  what  possible 
obligation  then  can  exist  between  them,  what  rule  or  princi- 
ple can  be  laid  down,  that  two  nonentities,  the  one  out  of 
existence,  and  the  other  not  in,  and  who  never  can  meet  in 
this  world,  that  the  one  should  control  the  other  to  the  end 
of  time? 

In  England,  it  is  said  that  money  cannot  be  taken  out  of 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN.  9 

the  pockets  of  the  people  without  their  consent ;  but  who 
authorized,  and  who  could  authorize  the  parliament  of  1688 
to  control  and  take  away  the  freedom  of  posterity,  and  limit 
and  confine  their  right  of  acting  in  certain  cases  for  ever, 
who  were  not  in  existence  to  give  or  withhold  their  consent  ? 

A  greater  absurdity  cannot  present  itself  to  the  under- 
standing of  man,  than  what  Mr.  Burke  offers  to  his  readers. 
He  tells  them,  and  he  tells  the  world  to  come,  that  a  certain 
body  of  men  who  existed  a  hundred  years  ago,  made  a  law, 
and  that  there  does  not  now  exist  in  the  nation,  nor  never 
will,  nor  never  can,  a  power  to  alter  it.  Under  how  many 
subtleties,  or  absurdities,  has  the  divine  right  to  govern  been 
imposed  on  the  credulity  of  mankind :  Mr.  Burke  has  dis- 
covered a  new  one,  and  he  has  shortened  his  journey  to 
Rome,  by  appealing  to  the  power  of  this  infallible  parlia- 
ment of  former  days ;  and  he  produces  what  it  has  done  as 
of  divine  authority ;  for  that  power  must  be  certainly  more 
than  human,  which  no  human  power  to  the  end  of  time  can 
alter. 

But  Mr.  Burke  has  done  some  servico,  not  to  his  cause, 
but  to  his  country,  by  bringing  those  clauses  into  public 
view.  They  serve  to  demonstrate  how  nec-ees'.iry  it  is  at  all 
times  to  watch  against  the  attempted  encroachment  of 
power,  and  to  prevent  its  running  to  excess.  It  is  some- 
what extraordinary  that  the  offence  for  which  James  II.  was 
expelled,  that  of  setting  up  power  by  assumption,  should 
be  re-acted  under  another  shape  and  form>  by  the  parliament 
that  expelled  him.  It  shows  that  the  rights  of  man  were 
but  imperfectly  understood  at  the  revolution ;  for  certain  it 
is  that  the  right  which  that  parliament  set  up  by  assumption 
(for  by  delegation  it  had  not,  and  could  not  have  it,  because 
none  could  give  it)  over  the  persons  and  freedom  of  posterity 
for  ever,  was  of  tne  same  tyrannical  unfounded  kind  which 
James  attempted  to  set  up  over  the  parliament  and  the 
nation,  and  for  which  he  was  expelled. 

The  only  difference  is,  (for  in  principle  they  differ  not) 
that  the  one  was  an  usurper  over  the  living,  and  the  other 
over  the  unborn ;  and  as  the  one  has  no  better  authority  to 
stand  upon  than  the  other,  both  of  them  must  be  equally 
null  and  void,  and  of  no  effect. 

From  what  or  whence,  does  Mr.  Burke  prove  the  right  of 
any  human  power  to  bind  posterity  for  ever?  He  has  pro- 
duced his  clauses ;  but  he  must  produce  also  his  proofs  that 
*uch  a  right  existed,  and  show  now  it  existed.  If  it  ever 


10  RIGHTS   OF   MAS. 

existed,  it  must  now  exist ;  for  whatever  appertains  to  the 
nature  of  man,  cannot  be  annihilated  by  man.  It  is  the 
nature  of  man  to  die,  and  he  will  continue  to  die  as  long  as 
he  continues  to  be  born.  But  Mr.  Burke  has  set  up  a  sort 
of  political  Adam,  in  whom  all  posterity  are  bound  for  ever ; 
he  must  therefore  prove  that  his  Adam  possessed  such  a 
power  or  such  a  right. 

The  weaker  any  cord  is,  the  less  it  will  bear  to  be  stretched, 
and  the  worse  is  the  policy  to  stretch  it,  unless  it  is  intended 
to  break  it.  Had  a  person  contemplated  the  overthrow  of 
Mr.  Burke's  positions,  he  would  have  proceeded  as  Mr. 
Burke  has  done.  He  would  have  magnified  the  authorities, 
on  purpose  to  have  called  the  right  of  them  into  question ; 
and  the  instant  the  question  of  right  was  started,  the  autho- 
rities must  have  been  given  up. 

It  requires  but  a  very  small  glance  of  thought  to  perceive, 
that  although  laws  made  in  one  generation  often  continue 
hi  force  through  succeeding  generations,  yet  they  continue 
to  derive  their  force  from  the  consent  of  the  living.  A  law 
not  repealed  continues  in  force,  not  because  it  cannot  be 
repealed,  but  because  it  is  not  repealed ;  and  the  non-repeal- 
ingpasses  for  consent. 

But  Mr.  Burke's  clauses  have  not  even  this  qualification  in 
their  favour.  They  become  null,  by  attempting  to  become 
immortal.  The  nature  of  them  precludes  consent.  They 
destroy  the  right  which  they  maght  have,  by  grounding  it  on 
a  right  which  they  cannot  have.  Immortal  power  is  not  a 
human  right,  and  therefore  cannot  be  a  right  of  parliament. 
The  parliament  of  1688  might  as  well  have  passed  an  act  to 
have  authorized  itself  to  live  for  ever,  as  to  make  their 
authority  live  for  ever.  All,  therefore,  that  can  be  said 
of  them  is,  that  they  are  a  formality  of  words,  of  as  mu  ih 
import,  as  if  those  who  used  them  had  addressed  a  con- 
gratulation to  themselves,  and,  in  the  oriental  style  of 
antiquity,  had  said,  O  !  parliament,  live  for  ever ! 

The  circumstances  of  the  world  are  continually  changing, 
and  the  opinions  of  men  change  also ;  and  as  government 
is  for  the  living,  and  not  for  the  dead,  it  is  the  living  only 
that  has  any  right  in  it.  That  which  may  be  thought  right 
and  found  convenient  in  one  age,  may  be  thought  wrong 
and  found  inconvenient  in  another.  In  such  cases,  who  is 
to  decide,  the  living,  or  the  dead? 

As  almost  one  hundred  pages  of  Mr.  Burke's  book  are 
employed  upon  those  clauses,  it  will  consequently  follow. 


BIGHTS    OF   M1N.  11 

that  if  the  clauses  themselves,  so  far  as  they  set  up  an 
assumed,  usurped,  dominion  over  posterity  for  ever,  are 
unauthoritative,  and  in  their  nature  null  and  void,  that  all 
his  voluminous  inferences  and  declamation  drawn  there- 
from, or  founded  thereon,  are  null  and  void  also  :  and  on 
this  ground  I  rest  the  matter. 

We  now  come  more  particularly  to  the  affairs  of  France. 
Mr.  Burke's  book  has  the  appearance  of  being  written  as  in- 
struction to  the  French  nation ;  but  if  I  may  permit  myself  the 
use  of  an  extravagant  metaphor,  suited  to  the  extravagance 
of  the  case,  it  is  darkness  attempting  to  illuminate  light. 

"While  I  am  writing  this,  there  is  accidentally  before  me 
some  proposals  for  a  declaration  of  rights  by  the  marquis  de 
la  Fayette  (I  ask  his  pardon  for  using  his  former  address, 
and  do  it  only  for  distinction's  sake)  to  the  national  assembly 
on  the  llth  of  July,  1789,  three  days  before  the  taking  of 
the  Bastile ;  and  I  cannot  but  be  struck  how  opposite  the 
sources  are  from  which  that  gentleman  and  Mr.  Burke 
draw  their  principles.  Instead  of  referring  to  musty  records 
and  mouldy  parchments,  to  prove  that  the  rights  of  the 
living  are  lost,  "renounced  and  abdicated  for  ever"  by 
those  who  are  now  no  more,  as  Mr.  Burke  has  done,  M.  de 
.a  Fayette  applies  to  the  living  world,  and  emphatically 
says,  "  Call  to  mind  the  sentiments  which  nature  has  en- 
graved in  the  heart  of  every  citizen,  and  which  take  a  new 
Ibrce  when  they  are  solemnly  recognized  by  all :  for  a  na- 
tion to  love  liberty,  it  is  sufficient  that  she  knows  it ;  and 
to  be  free  it  is  sufficient  that  she  wills  it."  How  dry, 
barren  and  obscure,  is  the  source  from  which  Mr.  Burke  la- 
bors ;  and  how  ineffectual,  though  embellished  with  flowers, 
is  all  his  declamation  and  his  argument,  compared  with 
these  clear,  concise  and  soul-animating  sentiments  :  few  and 
short  as  they  are,  they  lead  on  to  a  vast  field  of  generous 
and  manly  thinking,  and  do  not  finish,  like  Mr.  Burke's 
periods,  with  music  in  the  ear  and  nothing  in  the  heart. 

As  I  have  introduced  the  mention  of  M.  de  la  Fayette,  I 
will  take  the  liberty  of  adding  an  anecdote  respecting  his 
farewell  address  to  the  congress  of  America  in  1783,  and 
which  occurred  fresh  to  my  mind  when  I  saw  Mr.  Burke's 
thundering  attack  on  the  French  revolution. — M.  de  la 
Fayette  went  to  America  at  an  early  period  of  the  war,  and 
continued  a  volunteer  in  her  service  to  the  end.  His  con- 
duct throughout  the  whole  of  that  enterprise  is  one  of  the  most 
extraordinary  that  .is  to  be  found  in  the  history  of  a  young 


12  EIGHTS    OF   MAN. 

man,  scarcely  then  twenty  years  of  age.  Situated  in  a 
country  that  was  like  the  lap  of  sensual  pleasure,  and  with 
the  means  of  enjoying  it,  how  few  are  there  to  be  found  that 
would  exchange  such  a  scene  for  the  woods  and  wilderness 
of  America,  and  pass  the  flowery  years  of  youth  in  unpro- 
fitable danger  and  hardship  !  But  such  is  the  fact.  When 
the  war  ended,  and  he  was  on  the  point  of  taking  his  final 
departure,  he  presented  himself  to  congress,  and  contem- 
plating, in  his  affectionate  farewell,  the  revolution  he  had 
seen,  expressed  himself  in  these  words :  "  May  this  great 
monument  raised  to  Liberty ,  serve  as  a  lesson  to  the  oppressor, 
and  an  example  to  the  oppressed!"  When  this  address 
came  to  the  hands  of  Dr.  Franklin,  who  was  then  in  France, 
he  applied  to  count  Yergennes  to  have  it  inserted  in  the 
French  gazette,  but  never  could  obtain  his  consent.  The 
fact  was,  that  count  Yergennes  was  an  aristocratic  despot, 
at  home,  and  dreaded  the  example  of  the  American  revolu- 
tion in  France,  as  certain  other  persons  now  dread  the 
example  of  the  French  revolution  in  England;  and  Mr. 
Burke's  tribute  of  fear  (for  in  this  light  it  must  be  con- 
sidered) runs  parallel  with  count  Yergennes'  refusal.  But 
to  return  more  particularly  to  his  work. 

"  We  have  seen  (says  Mr.  Burke)  the  French  rebel  against 
a  mild  and  lawful  monarch,  with  more  fury,  outrage  and 
insult,  than  any  people  has  been  known  to  raise  against 
the  most  illegal  usurper,  or  the  most  sanguinary  tyrant." — 
This  is  one  among  a  thousand  other  instances,  in  which  Mr. 
Burke  shows  that  he  is  ignorant  of  the  springs  and  prin- 
ciples of  the  French  revolution. 

It  was  not  against  Louis  XYL  but  against  the  despotic 
principles  of  the  government,  that  the  nation  revolted. 
These  principles  had  not  their  origin  in  him,  but  in  the 
original  establishment,  many  centuries  back ;  and  they  were 
become  too  deeply  rooted  to  be  removed,  and  the  Augean 
stable  of  parasites  and  plunderers  too  abominably  filthy  to 
be  cleansed,  by  any  thing  short  of  complete  and  universal 
revolution. 

When  it  becomes  necessary  to  do  a  thing,  the  whole  heart 
should  join  in  the  measure,  or  it  should  not  be  attempted. 
That  crisis  was  then  arrived,  and  there  remained  no  choice 
but  to  act  with  determined  vigor,  or  not  to  act  at  all.  The 
king  was  known  to  be  the  friend  of  the  nation,  and  this  cir- 
cumstance was  favorable  to  the  enterprise.  Perhaps  no  man 
bred  up  in  the  style  of  an  absolute  king,  ever  possessed  a 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN. 


heart  so  little  disposed  to  the  exercise  of  that  species  of 
power  as  the  present  king  of  France.  But  the  principles  of 
the  government  itself  still  remained  the  same.  The  mon- 
arch and  monarchy  were  distinct  and  separate  things  ;  and 
it  was  against  the  established  despotism  of  the  latter,  and 
not  against  the  person  or  principles  of  the  former,  that  the 
revolt  commenced,  and  the  revolution  has  been  carried  on. 

Mr.  Burke  does  not  attend  to  this  distinction  between  men 
and  principles,  and  therefore  he  does  not  see  that  a  revolt 
may  take  place  against  the  despotism  of  the  latter,  while 
there  lies  no  charge  of  despotism  against  the  former. 

The  natural  moderation  of  Louis  XYI.  contributed  no- 
thing to  alter  the  hereditary  despotism  of  the  monarchy.  All 
the  tyrannies  of  former  reigns,  acted  under  that  hereditary 
despotism,  were  still  liable  to  be  revived  in  the  hands  of  a 
successor.  It  was  not  the  respite  of  a  reign  that  would 
satisfy  France,  enlightened  as  she  was  then  become.  A 
casual  discontinuance  of  the  practice  of  despotism,  is  not  a 
discontinuance  of  its  principles  ;  the  former  depends  on  the 
virtue  of  the  individual  who  is  in  immediate  possession  of 
the  power  ;  the  latter,  on  the  virtue  and  fortitude  of  the 
nation.  In  the  case  of  Charles  I.  and  James  II.  of  England, 
the  revolt  was  against  the  personal  despotism  of  the  men  ; 
whereas  in  France,  it  was  against  the  hereditary  despotism 
of  the  established  government.  But  men  who  can  consign 
over  the  rights  of  posterity  for  ever  on  the  authority  of  a 
mouldy  parchment,  like  Mr.  Burke,  are  not  qualified  to 
judge  of  this  revolution.  It  takes  in  a  field  too  vast  for  their 
views  to  explore,  and  proceeds  with  a  mightiness  of  reason 
they  cannot  keep  pace  with. 

But  there  are  many  points  of  view  in  which  this  revolu- 
tion may  be  considered.  When  despotism  has  established 
itself  for  ages  in  a  country,  as  in  France,  it  is  not  in  the  per- 
son of  the  king  only  that  it  resides.  It  has  the  appearance 
of  being  so  in  show,  and  in  nominal  authority  ;  but  it  is  not 
so  in  practice,  and  in  fact.  It  has  its  standard  every  where. 
Every  office  and  department  has  its  despotism,  founaed  upon 
custom  and  usage.  Every  place  has  its  Bastile,  and  every 
Bastile  its  despot.  The  original  hereditary  despotism  resi- 
dent in  the  person  of  the  king,  divides  and  sub-divides  itself 
into  a  thousand  shapes  and  forms,  till  at  last  the  whole  of  it 
is  acted  by  deputation.  —  This  was  the  case  in  France  ;  and 
against  this  species  of  despotism,  proceeding  on  through  an 
labyrinth  of  office  till  the  source  of  it  is  scarcely  per- 


14  BIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

septible,  there  is  no  mode  of  redress.  It  strengthens  itself 
by  assuming  the  appearance  of  duty,  and  tyrannizes  under 
thepretence  of  obeying. 

W  hen  a  man  reflects  on  the  condition  which  France  was  in 
from  the  nature  of  her  government,  he  will  see  other  causes 
for  revolt  than  those  which  immediately  connect  themselves 
with  the  person  or  character  of  Louis  XVI. — There  were, 
if  I  may  so  express  it,  a  thousand  despotisms  to  be  reformed 
in  France,  which  had  grown  up  under  the  hereditary  des- 
potism of  the  monarchy,  and  become  so  rooted  as  to  be  in  a 
great  measure  independent  of  it.  Between  the  monarchy, 
the  parliament,  and  the  church,  there  was  a  rivalship  of 
despotism  :  besides  the  feudal  despotism  operating  locally, 
and  the  ministerial  despotism  operating  everywhere.  But 
Mr.  Burke,  by  considering  the  king  as  the  only  possible  ob- 
ject of  a  revolt,  speaks  as  if  France  was  a  village,  in  which 
every  thing  that  passed  must  be  known  to  its  commanding 
officer,  and  no  oppression  could  be  acted  but  what  he  could 
immediately  control.  Mr.  Burke  might  have  been  in  the 
Bastile  his  whole  life,  as  well  under  Louis  XYI.  as  Louis 
XIV.  and  neither  the  one  or  the  other  have  known  that 
such  a  man  as  Mr.  Burke  existed.  The  despotic  principles 
of  the  government  were  the  same  in  both  reigns,  though  the 
dispositions  of  the  men  were  as  remote  as  tyranny  and 
benevolence. 

What  Mr.  Burke  considers  as  a  reproach  to  the  French 
revolution,  that  of  bringing  it  forward  under  a  reign  more 
mild  than  the  preceding  ones,  is  one  of  its  highest  honors. 
The  revolutions  that  have  taken  place  in  other  European 
countries,  have  been  excited  by  personal  hatred.  The  rage 
was  against  the  man,  and  he  became  the  victim. — But,  in 
the  instance  of  France,  we  see  a  revolution  generated  in  the 
rational  contemplation  of  the  rights  of  man,  and  distin- 
guishing from  the  beginning  between  persons  and  principles. 

But  Mr.  Burke  appears  to  have  no  idea  of  principles, 
when  he  is  contemplating  governments.  "  Ten  years  ago," 
says  he,  "  I  could  have  felicitated  France  on  her  having  a 
government,  without  inquiring  what  the  nature  of  that  gov- 
ernment was  or  how  it  was  administered."  Is  this  the  lan- 
guage  of  a  rational  man?  Is  it  the  language  of  a  heart 
feeling  as  it  ought  to  feel  for  the  rights  and  happiness  of  the 
human  race  ?  On  this  ground,  Mr.  Burke  must  compliment 
every  government  in  the  world,  while  the  victims  who  suffer 
under  them,  whether  sold  into  slavery  or  tortured  out  of 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN.  15 

existence,  are  wholly  forgotten.  It  is  power,  and  not  prin- 
ciples, that  Mr.  Burke  venerates;  and  under  this  abomina- 
ble depravity,  he  is  disqualified  to  judge  between  them. 
Thus  much  for  his  opinion  as  to  the  occasion  of  the  French 
revolution.  I  now  proceed  to  other  considerations. 

I  know  a  place  in  America  called  Point-no-Point ;  because 
as  you  proceed  along  the  shore,  gay  and  flowery  as  Mr. 
Burke's  language,  it  continually  recedes,  and  presents  itself 
at  a  distance  a-nead ;  and  when  you  have  got  as  far  as  you 
can  go,  there  is  no  point  at  all.  Just  thus  is  it  with  Mr. 
Burke's  three  hundred  and  fifty-six  pages.  It  is  therefore 
difficult  to  reply  to  him.  But  as  the  points  that  he  wishes 
to  establish  may  be  inferred  from  what  he  abuses,  it  is  in 
his  paradoxes  that  we  must  look  for  his  arguments. 

As  to  the  tragic  paintings  by  which  Mr.  Burke  has  out- 
raged his  own  imagination,  and  seeks  to  work  upon  that  of 
his  readers,  they  are  very  well  calculated  for  theatrical  repre- 
sentation, where  facts  are  manufactured  for  the  sake  of 
show,  and  accommodated  to  produce,  through  the  weakness 
of  sympathy,  a  weeping  enect.  But  Mr.  Burke  should 
recollect  that  he  is  writing  history,  and  not  plays  /  and  that 
his  readers  will  expect  truth,  and  not  the  spouting  rant  of 
high-toned  declamation. 

When  we  see  a  man  dramatically  lamenting  in  a  publica- 
tion intended  to  be  believed,  that  "  The  age  of  chivalry  is 
gone  /"  that  "  the  glory  of  Europe  is  extinguished^  forever  /" 
that  "  the  unbought  grace  of  life  (if  any  one  knows  what  it 
is,)  the  cheap  defence  of  nations,  the  nurse  of  manly  senti- 
ment and  heroic  enterprise  is  gone  /"  And  all  this  because 
the  Quixotic  age  of  cnivalric  nonsense  is  gone,  what  opinion 
can  we  form  of  his  judgment,  or  what  regard  can  we  pay  to 
his  facts?  In  the  rhapsody  of  his  imagination,  he  has  dis- 
covered a  world  of  windmills,  and  his  sorrows  are,  that  there 
are  no  Quixotes  to  attack  them.  But  if  the  age  of  aris- 
tocracy, like  that  of  chivalry,  should  fall,  and  they  had 
originally  some  connexion,  Mr.  Burke,  the  trumpeter  of  the 
order,  may  continue  his  parody  to  the  end,  and  finish  with 
exclaiming — "  Othello's  occupation's  gone  /" 

Notwithstanding  Mr.  Burke's  horrid  paintings,  when  the 
French  revolution  is  compared  with  that  of  other  countries, 
the  astonishment  will  be,  that  it  is  marked  with  so  few  sacri- 
fices ;  but  this  astonishment  will  cease  when  we  reflect  that 
it  was  principles,  and  not  persons,  thnt  were  the  meditated 
objects  of  destruction.  The  mind  of  the  nation  was  acted 


16  RIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

upon  by  a  higher  stimulus  than  what  the  consideration  of 
persons  could  inspire,  and  sought  a  higher  conquest  than 
could  be  produced  by  the  downfall  of  an  enemy. — Among 
the  few  who  fell,  there  do  not  appear  to  be  any  that -were 
intentionally  singled  out.  They,  all  of  them  had  their  fate 
in  the  circumstances  of  the  moment,  and  were  not  pursued 
with  that  long,  cold-blooded,  unabated  revenge  which  pur 
sued  the  unfortunate  Scotch,  in  the  affair  of  1745. 

Through  the  whole  of  Mr.  Burke's  book  I  do  not  observe 
that  the  Bastile  is  mentioned  more  than  once,  and  that  with 
a  kind  of  implication  as  if  he  was  sorry  it  is  pulled  down, 
and  wished  it  was  built  up  again.  "  We  have  rebuilt  New- 
gate (says  he)  and  tenanted  the  mansion;  and  we  have 
prisons  almost  as  strong  as  the  Bastile  for  those  who  dare  to 
libel  the  queen  of  France."*  As  to  what  a  madman,  like 
the  person  called  Lord  George  Gordon,  might  say,  and  to 
whom  Newgate  is  rather  a  bedlam  than  a  prison,  it  is  un- 
worthy a  rational  consideration.  It  was  a  madman  that 
'ibelled — and  that  is  sufficient  apology,  and  it  afforded  an 
opportunity  for  confining  him,  which  was  the  thing  wished 
for :  but  certain  it  is  that  Mr.  Burke,  who  does  not  call  him- 
self a  madman,  whatever  other  people  may  do,  has  libelled, 
in  the  most  unprovoked  manner,  and  in  the  grossest  style 
of  the  most  vulgar  abuse,  the  whole  representative  authority 
of  France ;  and  yet  Mr.  Burke  takes  his  seat  in  the  British 
house  of  commons ! — From  his,  violence  and  his  grief,  his 
silence  on  some  points  and  his  excess  on  others,  it  is  difficult 
not  to  believe  that  Mr.  Burke  is  sorry,  extremely  sorry,  that 
arbitrary  power,  the  power  of  the  pope  and  the  Bastile,  are 
pulled  down. 

Not  one  glance  of  compassion,  not  one  commiserating 
reflection,  that  I  can  find  throughout  his  book,  has  he. be- 
stowed on  those  that  lingered  out  the  most  wretched  of  lives, 
a  life  without  hope,  in  the  most  miserable  of  prisons.  It  ia 
painful  to  behold  a  man  employing  his  talents  to  corrupt 
himself.  Nature  has  been  kinder  to  Mr.  Burke  than  he  has 

*  Since  writing  the  above,  two  other  places  occur  in  Mr.  Burke's  pamphlet 
in  which  the  name  of  Bastile  is  mentioned  but  in  the  same  manner.  In  the 
one,  he  introduces  it  in  a  sort  of  obscure  question,  and  asks — "  Will  any  min- 
jsters  who  now  serve  such  a  king  with  but  a  decent  appearance  of  respect, 
cordially  obey  the  orders  of  those  whom  but  the  other  day,  in  his  name,  they 
had  committed  to  the  Bastile?"  In  the  other  the  taking  it  is  mentioned  as 
implying  criminality  in  the  French  guards  who  assisted  in  demolishing  it  — 
"  They  have  not,"  says  he,  "  forgot  the  taking  the  king's  castles  at  Paris." 
This  is  Mr.  Burke,  who  pretends  to  write  on  constitutional  frer  ions. 


BIGHTS  Of    MAN.  17 

to  her.  He  is  not  affected  by  the  reality  of  distress  touching 
upon  his  heart,  but  by  the  showy  resemblance  of  it  striking 
his  imagination.  He  pities  the  plumage  but  forgets  the 
dying  bird.  Accustomed  to  kiss  the  aristocratical  hand  that 
hath  purloined  him  from  himself,  he  degenerates  into  a  com- 
position of  art,  and  the  genuine  soul  of  nature  forsakes  him. 
His  hero  or  his  heroine  must  be  a  tragedy- victim,  expiring  in 
show,  and  not  the  real  prisoner  of  misery,  sliding  into  death 
in  the  silence  of  a  dungeon. 

As  Mr.  Burke  has  passed  over  the  whole  transaction  of  the 
Bastile  (and  his  silence  is  nothing  in  his  favour)  and  has 
entertained  his  readers  with  reflections  on  supposed  facts, 
distorted  into  real  falsehoods,  I  will  give,  since  he  has  not, 
some  account  of  the  circumstances  which  preceded  that 
transaction.  They  will  serve  to  show  that  less  mischief 
could  scarce  have  accompanied  such  an  event,  when  con- 
sidered with  the  treacherous  and  hostile  aggravations  of  the 
enemies  of  the  revolution. 

The  mind  can  hardly  picture  to  itself  a  more  tremendous 
scene  than  what  the  city  of  Paris  exhibited  at  the  time  of 
taking  the  Bastile,  and  for  two  days  before  and  after,  nor 
conceive  the  possibility  of  its  quieting  so  soon.  At  a  dis- 
tance, this  transaction  has  appeared  only  as  an  act  of  heroism 
standing  on  itself :  and  the  close  political  connexion  it  had 
with  the  revolution  is  lost  in  the  brilliancy  of  the  achieve- 
ment. But  we  are  to  consider  it  as  the  strength  of  the 
parties,  brought  man  to  man,  and  contending  for  the  issue. 
The  Bastile  was  to  be  either  the  prize  or  the  prison  of  the 
assailants.  The  downfall  of  it  included  the  idea  of  the 
downfall  of  despotism;  and  this  compounded  image  was 
become  as  figuratively  united,  as  Bunyan's  Doubting  Castle 
and  giant  Despair. 

The  national  assembly  before  and  at  the  time  of  taking 
the  Bastile,  were  sitting  at  Versailles,  twelve  miles  distant 
from  Paris.  About  a  week  before  the  rising  of  the  Paris- 
ians and  their  taking  the  Bastile,  it  was  discovered  that  a 
plot  was  forming,  at  the  head  of  which  was  the  count 
d'Artois,  the  king's  youngest  brother,  for  demolishing  the 
national  assembly,  seizing  its  members,  and  thereby  crush- 
ing, by  a  coup  de  ma/w,  all  hopes  and  prospects  of  forming 
a  free  government.  For  the  sake  of  humanity,  as  well  as  01 
freedom,  it  is  well  this  plan  did  not  succeed.  Examples  are 
not  wanting  to  show  how  dreadfully  vindictive  and  cruel  are 


IS  RIGHTS   OF   MAS. 

all  old  governments,  when  they  are  successful  against  what 
they  call  a  revolt. 

This  plan  must  have  been  some  time  in  contemplation  ; 
because,  in  order  to  carry  it  into  execution,  it  was  necessary 
to  collect  a  large  military  force  round  Paris,  and  to  cut  on 
the  communication  between  that  city  and  the  national  assem- 
bly at  Versailles.  The  troops  destined  for  this  service  were 
chiefly  the  foreign  troops  in  the  pay  of  France,  and  who  for 
this  particular  purpose,  were  drawn  from  the  distant  pro- 
vinces where  they  were  then  stationed.  When  they  were 
collected,  to  the  amount  of  between  twenty-five  and  thirty 
thousand,  it  was  judged  time  to  put  the  plan  in  execution. 
The  ministry  who  were  then  in  office,  and  who  were  friendly 
to  the  revolution,  were  instantly  dismissed,  and  a  new 
ministry  formed  of  those  who  had  concerted  the  project : — 
among  whom  was  count  de  Broglio,  and  to  his  share  was 
given  the  command  of  those  troops.  The  character  of  this 
man,  as  described  to  me  in  a  letter  which  I  communicated 
to  Mr.  Burke  before  he  began  to  write  his  book,  and  from 
an  authority  which  Mr.  Burke  well  knows  was  good,  was 
that  of  "  a  high-flying  aristocrat,  cool,  and  capable  of  every 
mischief." 

While  these  matters  were  agitating,  the  national  assembly 
stood  in  the  most  perilous  and  critical  situation  that  a  body 
of  men  can  be  supposed  to  act  in.  They  were  the  devoted 
victims,  and  they  knew  it.  They  had  the  hearts  and  wishes 
of  their  country  on  their  side,  but  military  authority  they 
had  none.  The  guards  of  Broglio  surrounded  the  hall  where 
the  assembly  sat,  ready,  at  the  word  of  command,  to  seize 
their  persons,  as  had  been  done  the  year  before  to  the  parlia- 
ment in  Paris.  Had  the  national  assembly  deserted  their 
trust,  or  had  they  exhibited  signs  of  weakness  or  fear,  their 
enemies  had  been  encouragea,  and  the  country  depressed. 
When  the  situation  they  stood  in,  the  cause  they  were 
engaged  in,  and  the  crisis  then  ready  to  burst  which  should 
determine  their  personal  and  political  fate,  and  that  of  their 
country,  and  probably  of  Europe,  are  taken  into  one  visw, 
none  but  a  heart  callous  with  prejudice,  or  corrupted  by 
dependance,  can  avoid  interesting  itself  in  their  success. 

The  archbishop  of  Yienne  was  at  this  time  president  of  the 
national  assembly ;  a  person  too  old  to  undergo  the  scene 
that  a  few  days,  or  a  few  hours,  might  bring  forth.  A  man 
of  more  activity,  and  bolder  fortitude,  was  necessary  ;  and 
tho  national  assembly  chuse  (under  the  form  of  vice-presi 


BIGHTS    OF   MAN.  1$ 

-dent,  for  the  presidency  still  rested  in  tlie  archbishop)  M.  de 
la  Fayette ;  and  this  is  the  only  instance  of  a  vice-president 
being  chosen.  It  was  at  the  moment  this  storm  was  pend- 
ing, July  11,  that  a  declaration  of  rights  was  brought  for- 
ward by  M.  de  la  Fayette,  and  is  the  same  which  is  alluded 
to  in  page  51.  It  was  hastily  drawn  up,  and  makes  only  a 
part  of  a  more  extensive  declaration  01  rights,  agreed  upon 
and  adopted  afterwards  by  the  national  assembly.  The  par- 
ticular reason  for  bringing  it  forward  at  this  moment  (M.  de 
la  Fayette  has  since  informed  me)  was,  that  if  the  national 
assembly  should  fall  in  the  threatened  destruction  that  then 
surrounded  it,  some  trace  of  its  principles  might  have  a 
chance  of  surviving  the  wreck. 

Every  thing  was  now  drawing  to  a  crisis.  The  event  was 
freedom  or  slavery.  On  one  side  an  army  of  nearly  thirty 
thousand  men ;  on  the  other  an  unarmed  body  of  citizens, 
for  the  citizens  of  Paris  on  whom  the  national  assembly 
must  then  immediately  depend,  were  as  unarmed  and  un- 
disciplined as  the  citizens  of  London  are  now.  The  French 
guards  had  given  strong  symptoms  of  their  being  attached 
to  the  national  cause  ;  but  their  numbers  were  small,  not  a 
tenth  part  of  the  force  which  Broglio  commanded,  and  their 
officers  were  in  the  interest  of  Broglio. 

Matters  being  now  ripe  for  execution,  the  new  ministry 
made  their  appearance  in  office.  The  reader  will  carry  in 
his  mind,  that  the  Bastile  was  taken  the  14th  of  July  :  the 
point  of  time  I  am  how  speaking  to,  is  the  12th.  As  soon 
as  the  news  of  the  change  of  ministry  reached  Paris  in  the 
afternoon,  all  the  play-houses  and  places  of  entertainment, 
sliops  and  bouses,  were  shut  up.  The  change  of  ministry 
was  considered  as  the  prelude  of  hostilities,  and  the  opinion 
was  rightly  founded. 

The  foreign  troops  began  to  advance  towards  the  city. 
The  prince  de  Lambesc,  who  commanded  a  body  of  German 
cavalry,  approached  by  the  palace  of  Louis  X  V .  which  con- 
nects itself  with  some  of  the  streets.  In  his  march  he  in- 
sulted and  struck  an  old  man  with  his  sword.  The  French 
are  remarkable  for  their  respect  to  old  age,  and  the  insolence 
with  which  it  appeared  to  be  done,  uniting  with  the  general 
fermentation  they  were  in,  produced  a  powerful  effect,  and 
a  cry  of  to  arms  !  to  a/rms  /  spread  itself  in  a  moment  over 
the  whole  city. 

Arms  they  had  none,  nor  scarcely  any  who  knew  the  use 
of  them ;  but  desperate  resolution,  when  every  hope  is  at 


20  RIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

stake,  supplies,  for  a  while,  the  want  of  anus,  i^eur  where 
the  prince  de  Lambesc  was  drawn  up,  were  large  piles  of 
stones  collected  for  building  the  new  bridge,  and  with  these 
the  people  attacked  the  cavalry.  A  party  of  the  French 
guards,  upon  hearing  the  firing,  rushed  from  their  quarters 
and  joined  the  people;  and  night  coming  on,  the  cavalry 
retreated. 

The  streets  of  Paris,  being  narrow,  are  favourable  for  de- 
fence ;  and  the  loftiness  of  the  houses,  consisting  of  many 
stories,  from  which  great  annoyance  might  be  given,  secured 
them  against  nocturnal  enterprises ;  and  the  night  was  spent 
in  providing  themselves  with  every  sort  of  weapon  they 
could  make  or  procure :  guns,  swords,  blacksmiths'  ham- 
mers, carpenters'  axes,  iron  crows,  pikes,  halberds,  pitchforks, 
spits,  clubs,  &c. 

The  incredible  numbers  with  which  they  assembled  the 
next  morning,  and  the  still  more  incredible  resolution  they 
exhibited  embarrassed  and  astonished  their  enemies.  Little 
did  the  new  ministry  expect  such  a  salute.  Accustomed  to 
slavery  themselves,  they  had  no  idea  that  liberty  was  capa- 
ble of  such  inspiration,  or  that  a  body  of  unarmed  citizens 
would  dare  face  the  military  force  of  thirty  thousand  men. 
Every  moment  of  this  day  was  employed  in  collecting  arms, 
concerting  plans,  and  arranging  themselves  in  the  best  order 
which  sucn  an  instantaneous  movement  could  afford. 
.Broglio  continued  lying  around  the  city,  but  made  no  further 
advances  this  day,  and  the  succeeding  night  passed  with 
as  much  tranquillity  as  such  a  scene  could  possibly  pro- 
duce. 

But  the  defence  only  was  not  the  object  of  the  citizens. 
They  had  a  cause  at  stake,  on  which  depended  their  freedom 
or  their  slavery.  They  every  moment  expected  an  attack, 
or  to  hear  of  one  made  on  the  national  assembly  ;  and  in 
such  a  situation,  the  most  prompt  measures  are  sometimes 
the  best.  The  object  that  now  presented  itself,  was  the 
Bastile  ;  and  the  eclat  of  carrying  such  a  fortress  in  the  face 
of  such  an  army,  could  not  fail  to  strike  terror  into  the  new 
ministry,  who  had  scarcely  yet  had  time  to  meet.  By 
some  intercepted  correspondence  this  morning,  it  was  dis- 
covered that  the  mayor  of  Paris,  M.  de  Flesseles,  who  ap- 
peared to  be  in  their  interest,  was  betraying  them ;  and  from 
this  discovery  there  remained  no  doubt  that  Broglio  would 
reinforce  the  Bastile  the  ensuing  evening.  It  was  therefore 
necessary  to  attack  it  that  day ;  but  before  this  could  be 


BIGHTS   OF    MAN.  31 

done,  it  was  first  necessary  to  procure  a  better  supply  of 
arms  than  they  were  then  possessed  of. 

There  was,  adjoining  to  the  city,  a  large  magazine  of 
arms  deposited  at  the  hospital  of  the  invalids,  which  the 
citizens  summoned  to  surrender  ;  and  as  the  place  was  not 
defensible,  nor  attempted  much  defence,  they  soon  suc- 
ceeded. Thus  supplied,  they  marched  to  attack  the  Bastile ; 
a  vast  mixed  multitude  of  all  ages  and  of  all  degrees,  and 
armed  with  all  sorts  of  weapons.  Imagination  would  fail 
of  describing  to  itself  the  appearance  of  such  a  procession, 
and  of  the  anxiety  for  the  events  which  a  few  hours  or  a 
few  minutes  might  produce.  What  plans  the  ministry  was 
forming,  were  as  unknown  to  the  people  within  the  city,  as 
what  the  citizens  were  doing  was  unknown  to  them  ;  and 
what  movements  Broglio  might  make  for  the  support  or 
relief  of  the  place,  were  to  the  citizens  equally  unknown. 
All  was  mystery  and  hazard. 

That  the  Bastile  was  attacked  with  an  enthusiasm  of 
heroism,  such  only  as  the  highest  animation  of  liberty  could 
inspire,  and  carried  in  the  space  of  a  few  hours,  is  an  event 
which  the  world  is  fully  possessed  of.  I  am  not  undertaking 
a  detail  of  the  attack,  but  bringing  into  view  the  conspiracy 
against  the  nation  which  provoked  it,  and  which  fell  with 
the  Bastile.  The  prison  to  which  the  new  ministry  were 
dooming  the  national  assembly,  in  addition  to  its  being  the 
high  altar  and  castle  of  despotism,  became  the  proper  object 
to  begin  with.  This  enterprise  broke  up  the  new  ministry, 
who  began  now  to  fly  from  the  ruin  they  had  prepared  for 
others.  The  troops  of  Broglio  dispersed,  and  himself  fled  also. 

Mr.  Burke  has  spoken  a  great  deal  about  plots,  and  he 
has  never  once  spoken  of  this  plot  against  the  national  as- 
sembly and  the  1'iberties  of  the  nation  ;  and  that  he  might 
not,  'ie  has  passed  over  all  the  circumstances  that  might 
throw  it  in  his  way.  The  exiles  who  have  fled  from  France, 
whose  cause  he  so  much  interests  himself  in,  and  from  whom 
he  has  had  his  lesson,  fled  in  consequence  of  the  miscarriage 
of  this  plot.  No  plot  was  formed  against  them :  it  was 
they  who  were  plotting  against  others ;  and  those  who  fell, 
met,  not  unjustly,  the  punishment  they  were  preparing  to 
execute.  But  will  Mr.  Burke  say  that  if  this  plot,  con- 
trived with  the  subtlety  of  an  ambuscade,  had  succeeded,  the 
successful  party  would  have  restrained  their  wrath  so  soon? 
Let  the  history  of  all  old  governments  answer  the  question. 

Whom  has  the  national  assembly  brought  to  the  scaffold  f 


22  BIGHTS    OF   MAJS. 

None.  They  were  themselves  the  devoted  victims  of  thig 
plot,  and  they  have  not  retaliated ;  why  then  are  they 
charged  with  revenge  they  have  not  acted?  In  the  tre 
mendous  breaking  forth  of  a  whole  people,  in  which  all 
degrees,  tempers  and  characters  are  confounded,  and  de- 
livering themselves  by  a  miracle  of  exertion,  from  the 
destruction  meditated  against  them,  is  it  to  be  expected 
that  nothing  will  happen  ?  When  men  are  sore  with  the 
sense  of  oppressions,  and  menaced  with  the  prospect  of  new 
ones,  is  the  calmness  of  philosophy,  or  the  palsy  of  insen- 
sibility to  be  looked  for?  Mr.  Burke  exclaims  against 
outrage,  yet  the  greatest  is  that  which  he  has  committed. 
His  book  is  a  volume  of  outrage,  and  not  apologized  for  by 
the  impulse  of  a  moment,  but  cherished  through  a  space  of 
ten  months  ;  yet  Mr.  Burke  had  no  provocation,  no  life,  no 
interest  at  stake. 

More  citizens  fell  in  this  struggle  than  of  their  opponents ; 
but  four  or  five  persons  were  seized  by  the  populace,  and 
instantly  put  to  death  ;  the  governor  of  the  Bastile  and  the 
mayor  of  Paris,  who  was  detected  in  the  act  of  betraying 
them ;  and  afterwards  Foulon,  one  of  the  new  ministry,  and 
Berthier,  his  son-in-law  who  had  accepted  the  office  of 
intendant  of  Paris.  Their  heads  were  stuck  upon  pikes,  and 
carried  about  the  city ;  and  it  is  upon  this  mode  of  punish- 
ment that  Mr.  Burke  builds  a  great  part  of  his  tragic 
scenes.  Let  us  therefore  examine  how  men  came  by  the 
idea  of  punishing  in  this  manner. 

They  learn  it  from  the  governments  they  live  under ;  and 
retaliate  the  punishments,  they  have  been  accustomed  to 
behold.  The  heads  stuck  upon  pikes  which  remained  for 
years  on  Temple-bar  differed  nothing  in  the  horror  of  the 
scene  from  those  carried  about  on  the  pikes  at  Paris  :  yet 
this  was  done  by  the  English  government.  It  may,  per- 
haps, be  said,  that  it  signifies  nothing  to  a  man  what  is 
done  to  him  after  he  is  dead ;  but  it  signifies  much  to  the 
living :  it  either  tortures  their  feelings  or  hardens  their 
hearts ;  and  in  either  case,  it  instructs  them  how  to  punish 
when  power  falls  into  their  hands. 

Lay  then  the  axe  to  the  root,  and  teach  governments  hu- 
manity. It  is  their  sanguinary  punishments  which  corrupt 
mankind.  In  England,  the  punishment  in  certain  cases  is, 
by  hanging,  drawi'ng,  and  quartering •  the  heart  of  the 
sufferer  is  cut  out,  and  held  up  to  the  view  of  the  populace. 
In  France,  under  the  former  government,  the  punishments 


BIGHTS   OF  KAN.  23 

were  not  less  barbarous.  Who  does  not  remember  the  exe- 
cution of  Damien,  torn  to  pieces  by  horses  ?  The  effect  of 
these  cruel  spectacles  exhibited  to  the  populace,  is  to  destroy 
tenderness  or  excite  revenge ;  and  by  the  base  and  false  idea 
of  governing  men  by  terror  instead  of  reason,  they  become 
precedents.  It  is  over  the  lowest  class  of  mankind  that  gov- 
ernment by  terror  is  intended  to  operate,  and  it  is  on  them 
that  it  operates  to  the  worst  effect.  They  have  sense  enough 
to  feel  that  they  are  the  objects  aimed  at ;  and  they  inflict 
in  their  turn  the  examples  ot  terror  they  have  been  instructed 
to  practise. 

There  are  in  all  European  countries,  a  large  class  of  peo- 
ple of  that  description  which  in  England  are  called  the 
"  mob"  Of  this  class  were  those  who  committed  the  burn- 
ings and  devastations  in  London  in  1780,  and  of  this  clasp 
were  those  who  carried  the  heads  upon  pikes  in  Paris.  Fou- 
lon  and  Berthier  were  taken  up  in  the  country,  and  sent  to 
Paris  to  undergo  their  examination  at  the  hotel  de  Yille ; 
for  the  national  assembly,  immediately  on  the  new  ministry 
coming  into  office,  passed  a  decree,  which  they  communi- 
cated to  the  king  and  cabinet,  that  they  (the  national  assem- 
bly) would  hold  the  ministry,  of  which  Foulon  was  one,  re- 
sponsible for  the  measures  they  were  advising  and  pursuing ; 
but  the  mob,  incensed  at  the  appearance  of  Foulon  and  Ber- 
thier, tore  them  from  their  conductors  before  they  were  car- 
ried to  the  hotel  de  Yille,  and  executed  them  on  the  spot. 
Why  then  does  Mr.  Burke  charge  outrages  of  this  kind  upon 
a  wnole  people  ?  As  well  may  he  charge  the  riots  and  out- 
rages of  1780  on  the  whole  people  of  London,  or  those  in 
Ireland  on  all  his  country. 

But  everything  we  see  or  hear  offensive  to  our  feelings, 
and  derogatory  to  the  human  character,  should  lead  to  other 
reflections  than  those  of  reproach.  Even  the  beings  who 
commit  them  have  some  claim  to  our  consideration.  How 
then  is  it  that  such  vast  classes  of  mankind  as  are  distin- 
guished by  the  appellation  of  the  vulgar,  or  the  ignorant 
mob,  are  so  numerous  in  all  old  countries  ?  The  instant  we 
ask  ourselves  this  question,  reflection  finds  an  answer.  They 
arise,  as  an  unavoidable  consequence,  out  of  the  ill  construc- 
tion of  all  the  old  government  in  Europe,  England  included 
with  the  rest.  It  is  by  distortedly  exalting  some  men,  that 
others  are  distortedly  debased,  till  the  whole  is  out  of  nature. 
A.  vast  mass  of  mankind  are  degradedly  thrown  into  the 
back  ground  of  the  human  picture,  to  bring  forward,  with 


24  EIGHTS    OF   MAN. 

greater  glare,  the  puppet-show  of  state  and  aristocracy.  In 
the  commencement  of  a  revolution,  those  men  are  rather  the 
followers  of  the  camp  than  of  the  standard  of  liberty,  and 
have  yet  to  be  instructed  how  to  reverence  it. 

I  give  to  Mr.  Burke  all  his  theatrical  exaggerations  for 
facts,  and  I  then  ask  him,  if  they  do  not  establish  the  cer- 
tainty of  what  I  here  lay  down  ?  Admitting  them  to  be 
true,  they  show  the  necessity  of  the  French  revolution,  as 
much  as  any  one  thing  he  could  have  asserted.  These  out- 
rages are  not  the  effect  of  the  principles  of  the  revolution, 
but  of  the  degraded  mind  that  existed  before  the  revolution, 
and  which  the  revolution  is  calculated  to  reform.  Place 
them  then  to  their  proper  cause,  and  take  the  reproach  of 
them  to  your  own  side. 

It  is  to  the  honor  of  the  national  assembly,  and  the  city 
of  Paris,  that  during  such  a  tremendous  scene  of  arms  and 
confusion,  beyond  the  control  of  all  authority,  that  they 
have  been  able  by  the  influence  of  example  and  exhortation, 
to  restrain  so  much.  Never  was  more  pains  taken  to  in- 
struct and  enlighten  mankind,  and  to  make  them  see  that 
their  interest  consisted  in  their  virtue,  and  not  in  their  re- 
venge, than  what  have  been  displayed  in  the  revolution  of 
France. — I  now  proceed  to  make  some  remarks  on  Mr. 
Burke's  account  of  the  expedition  to  Versailles,  on  the  5th 
and  6th  of  October. 

I  can  consider  Mr.  Burke's  book  in  scarcely  any  other  light 
than  a  dramatic  performance ;  and  he  must,  I  think,  have 
considered  it  in  the  same  light  himself,  by  the  poetical  liber- 
ties he  has  taken  of  omitting  some  facts,  distorting  others, 
and  making  the  machinery  bend  to  produce  a  stage  effect. 
Of  this  kind  is  his  account  of  the  expedition  to  Versailles. 
He  begins  this  account  by  omitting  the  only  facts  which,  as 
causes,  are  known  to  be  true ;  every  thing  beyond  these  is 
conjecture  even  in  Paris  ;  and  he  then  works  up  a  tale  ac- 
commodated to  his  own  passions  and  prejudices. 

It  is  to  be  observed  throughout  Mr.  JBurke's  book,  that  h ) 
never  speaks  of  plots  against  the  revolution  ;  and  it  is  from 
those  plots  that  all  the  mischiefs  have  arisen.  It  suits  his 
purpose  to  exhibit  consequences  without  their  causes.  It  is 
one  of  the  arts  of  the  drama  to  do  so.  If  the  crimes  of 
men  were  exhibited  with  their  suffering,  the  stage  effect 
would  sometimes  be  lost,  and  the  audience  would  be  inclined 
to  approve  where  it  was  intended  they  should  commiserate. 

After  all  the  investigations  that  have  been  made  into  thii 


EIGHTS   OF   MAN.  23 

•iitiicate  affair  (the  expedition  to  Versailles,)  it  still  remains 
enveloped  in  all  that  kind  of  mystery  whicn  ever  accorapa 
nies  events  produced  more  from  a  concurrence  of  awkward 
circumstances,  than  from  fixed  design.  While  the  charac- 
ters of  men  are  forming,  as  is  always  the  case  in  revolutions, 
there  is  a  reciprocal  suspicion,  and  a  disposition  to  misin- 
terpret each  other;  and  even  parties  directly  opposite  in 
principle,  will  sometimes  concur  in  pushing  forward  the 
same  movement  with  very  different  views,  and  with  the 
hopes  of  its  producing  very  different  consequences.  A  great 
deal  of  this  may  be  discovered  in  this  embarrassed  affair, 
and  yet  the  issue  of  the  whole  was  what  nobody  had  in 
view. 

The  only  things  certainly  known  are,  that  congiderable 
uneasiness  was  at  this  time  excited  in  Paris,  by  the  delay  of 
the  king  in  not  sanctioning  and  forwarding  the  decrees  of 
the  national  assembly,  particularly  that  of  the  declaration 
of  the  rights  of  man,  and  the  decrees  of  ^h^  fourth  of  August, 
which  contained  the  foundation  principles  on  whicn  the  con- 
stitution was  to  be  erected.  The  kindest,  and  perhaps  tho 
fairest,  conjecture  upon  this  matter  is,  that  some  of  tho 
ministers  intended  to  make  observations  upon  certain  parts 
of  them,  before  they  were  finally  sanctioned  and  sent  to  tho 
provinces ;  but  be  tnis  as  it  may,  the  enemies  of  the  revolu- 
tion derived  hopes  from  the  delay,  and  the  friends  of  the 
revolution,  uneasiness. 

During  this  state  of  suspense,  the  gardes  du  corps,  which 
was  composed,  as  such  regiments  generally  are,  of  persons 
much  connected  with  the  court,  gave  an  entertainment  at 
Versailles  (Oct.  1,)  to  some  foreign  regiments  then  arrived ; 
and  when  the  entertainment  was  at  its  height,  on  a  signal 
given,  the  gardes  du  corps  tore  the  national  cockade  from 
tneir  hats,  trampled  it  under  foot,  and  replaced  it  with  a 
counter  cockade  prepared  for  the  purpose.  An  indig- 
nity of  this  kind  amounted  to  defiance.  It  was  like  declar- 
ing war;  and  if  men  will  give  challenges,  they  must 
expect  consequences.  But  all  this  Mr.  Burke  has  carefully 
kept  out  of  sight.  He  begins  his  account  by  saying,  "  His- 
tory will  record,  that  on  the  morning  of  the  6th  of  October, 
1789,  the  king  and  queen  of  France,  after  a  day  of  confu- 
sion, alarm,  dismay  and  slaughter,  lay  down  under  the 
pledged  security  of  public  faith,  to  indulge  nature  in.  a  few 
hours  of  respite,  and  troub.ed  melancholy  repose."  This  is 
neither  the  sober  style  of  history,  nor  the  intention  oi  it. 


26  BIGHTS   OF   MAN 

It  leaves  every  thing  to  be  guessed  at,  and 'mistaken  One 
would  at  least  think  there  nad  been  a  battle ;  and  a  battle 
there  probably  would  have  been,  had  it  not  been  for  the 
moderating  prudence  of  those  whom  Mr.  Burke  involves  in 
his  censures.  By  his  keeping  the  gardes  du  corps  out  of 
sight  Mr.  Burke  has  afforded  himself  the  dramatic  licence 
of  putting  the  king  and  queen  in  their  places,  as  if  the 
object  of  the  expedition  was  against  them. — But,  to  return 
to  my  account — 

This  conduct  of  the  gardes  du  corps,  as  might  well  be 
expected,  alarmed  and  enraged  the  Parisians :  the  colors  of 
the  cause  and  the  cause  itself,  were  become  too  united  to 
mistake  the  intention  of  the  insult,  and  the  Parisians  were 
determined  to  call  the  gardes  du  corps  to  an  account.  There 
was  certainly  nothing  of  the  cowardice  of  assassination  in 
marching  in  the  face  of  day  to  demand  satisfaction,  if  such 
a  phrase  may  be  used,  of  a  body  of  armed  men  who  had 
voluntarily  given  defiance.  But  the  circumstance  which 
serves  to  throw  this  affair  into  embarrassment  is,  that  the 
enemies  of  the  revolution  appear  to  have  encouraged  it,  as 
well  as  its  friends.  The  one  hoped  to  prevent  a  civil  war, 
by  'checking  it  in  time,  and  the  other  to  make  one.  The 
hopes  of  those  opposed  to  the  revolution,  rested  in  making 
the  king  of  their  party,  and  getting  him  from  Versailles  to 
Metz.  where  they  expected  to  collect  a  force,  and  set  up  a 
standard.  We  have  therefore  two  different  objects  presenting 
themselves  at  the  same  time,  and  to  be  accomplished  by  the 
same  means ;  the  one,  to  chastise  the  gardes  du  corps  which 
was  the  object  of  the  Parisians ;  the  other,  to  render  the 
confusion  of  such  a  scene  an  inducement  to  the  king  to  set 
off  for  Metz. 

On  the  5th  of  October,  a  very  numerous  body  of  women, 
and  men  in  the  disguise  of  women,  collected  round  the  hotel 
de  Yille,  or  town  hall,  at  Paris,  and  set  off  for  Versailles. 
Their  professed  object  was  the  gardes  du  corps/  but  pru- 
dent men  readily  recollected  that  mischief  is  easier  begun 
than  ended ;.  and  this  impressed  itself  with  the  more  force, 
from  the  suspicions  already  stated,  and  the  irregularity  of 
such  a  cavalcade.  As  soon  therefore  as  a  sufficient  force 
could  be  collected,  M.  de  la  Fayette,  by  orders  from  the 
civil  authority  of  Paris,  set  off  after  them  at  the  head  of 
twenty  thousand  of  the  Paris  militia.  The  revolution  could 
derive  no  benefit  from  confusion,  and  itg  opposers  might. 
By  an  amiable  and  spirited  manner  of  address,  he  had 


RIGHTS   OP    MAN.  27 

hitherto  been  fortunate  in  calming  disquietudes,  and  in  this 
he  was  extraordinarily  successful ;  to  frustrate,  therefore,  the 
hopes  of  those  who  might  seek  to  improve  this  scene  into  a 
sort  of  justifiable  necessity  for  the  king's  quitting  Versailles 
and  withdrawing  to  Metz,  and  to  prevent,  at  the  same  time, 
tho  consequences  that  might  ensue  between  the  gardes  du 
corps  and  this  phalanx  ot  men  and  women,  he  forwarded 
expresses  to  the  Jsing,  that  he  was  on  his  march  to  Versailles, 
by  the  orders  of  the  civil  authority  of  Paris,  for  the  purpose 
01  peace  and  protection,  expressing  at  the  same  time  the 
necessity  of  restraining  the  gardes  du  corps  from  firing  on 
the  people.* 

He  arrived  at  Versailles  between  ten  and  eleven  o'clock 
at  night.  The  gardes  du  corps  were  drawn  up,  and  the 
people  had  arrived  some  time  before,  but  every  thing  had 
remained  suspended.  Wisdom  and  policy  now  consisted  in 
changing  a  scene  of  danger  into  a  happy  event.  M.  de  la 
Fayette  became  the  mediator  between  the  enraged  parties  ; 
and  the  king,  to  remove  the  uneasiness  which  had  arisen 
from  the  delay  already  stated,  sent  for  the  president  of  the 
national  assembly,  and  signed  the  declaration  of  the  rights 
of  man,  and  such  other  parts  of  the  constitution  as  were  in 
readiness. 

It  was  now  about  one  in  the  morning.  Everv  thing  ap- 
peared to  be  composed,  and  a  general  congratulation  took 
place.  At  the  beat  of  drum  a  proclamation  was  made,  that 
the  citizens  of  Versailles  would  give  the  hospitality  of  their 
houses  to  their  fellow-citizens  of  Paris.  Tnose  who  could 
not  be  accommodated  in  this  manner,  remained  in  the 
streets,  or  took  up  their  quarters  in  the  churches ;  and  at 
two  o'clock  the  king  and  queen  retired. 

In  this  state  matters  passed  until  the  break  of  day,  when  a 
a  fresh  disturbance  arose  from  the  censurable  conduct  of  some 
of  both  parties ;  for  such  characters  there  will  be  in  all  such 
scenes.  One  of  the  gardes  du  corps  appeared  at  one  of  the 
windows  of  the  palace,  and  the  people  who  had  remained 
during  the  night  in  the  streets  accosted  him  with  reviling 
and  provocative  language.  Instead  of  retiring,  as  in  such  a 
case  prudence  would  have  dictated,  he  presented  his  musket, 
fired,  and  killed  one  of  the  Paris  militia.  The  peace  being 
thus  broken,  the  people  rushed  into  the  palace  in  quest  of 
the  offender.  They  attacked  the  quarters  of  the  gardes  du 

*  I  am  warranted  in  asserting  this,  as  I  had  it  from  M.  de  la  FayettJ,  witb 
wlitirn  I  have  livpij  iii  habits  of  r-iendship  for  fourteen  jears. 


28  EIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

corps  within  the  palace,  and  pursued  them  through  the 
avenues  of  it,  and  to  the  apartments  of  the  king.  On  this 
tumult,  not  the  queen  only,  as  Mr.  Burke  has  represented 
it,  but  every  person  in  the  palace,  was  awakened  and 
alarmed ;  and  M.  de  la  Fayette  had  a  second  time  to  inter- 
pose between  the  parties,  the  event  of  which  was,  that  the 
yardes  du  corps  put  on  the  national  cockade,  and  the  matter 
ended,  as  by  oblivion,  after  the  loss  of  two  or  three  lives. 

During  the  latter  part  of  the  time  in  which  this  confusion 
was  acting,  the  king  and  queen  were  in  public  at  the  bal- 
cony, and  neither  of  them  concealed  for  safety's  sake,  as  Mr. 
Burke  insinuates.  Matters  being  thus  appeased,  and  tran- 
quillity restored,  a  general  acclamation  broke  forth,  of  le  roi 
a  Paris — le  roi  a  Paris — the  king  to  Paris.  It  was  the 
shout  of  peace,  and  immediately  accepted  on  the  part  of  the 
king.  By  this  measure,  all  future  projects  of  trepanning 
the  king  to  Metz,  and  setting  up  the  standard  of  opposition 
to  the  constitution  were  prevented,  and  the  suspicions  extin- 
guished. The  king  and  his  family  reached  Paris  in  the 
evening,  and  were  congratulated  on  their  arrival  by  M. 
Bailley,  the  mayor  of  Paris,  in  the  name  of  the  citizens. 
Mr.  Burke,  who  throughout  his  book  confounds  things,  per- 
sons, and  principles,  has,  in  his  remarks  on  M.  Bailley's 
address,  confounded  time  also.  He  censures  M.  Bailley  for 
calling  it,  "  un  bon  jour"  a  good  day.  Mr.  Burke  should 
have  informed  himself,  that  this  scene  took  up  the  space  of 
two  days,  the  day  on  which  it  began  with  every  appearance 
of  danger  and  mischief,  and  the  day  on  which  it  terminated 
without  the  mischiefs  that  threatened ;  and  that  it  is  to  this 
peaceful  termination  that  M.  Bailley  alludes,  and  to  the 
arrival  of  the  king  at  Paris.  Not  less  than  three  hundred 
thousand  persons  arranged  themselves  in  the  procession  from 
Versailles  to  Paris,  and  not  an  act  of  molestation  was  com- 
mitted during  the  whole  march. 

Mr.  Burke,  on  the  authority  of  M.  Lally  Tollendal,  a 
deserter  from  the  national  assembly,  says,  that  on  entering 
Paris,  the  people  shouted,  "  tons  les  eveques  a  la  lanterne. 
AH  bishops  to  be  hanged  at  the  lantern  or  lamp-posts.  It 
was  surprising  that  nobody  should  hear  this  but  Lally  Tol- 
lendal, and  that  nobody  should  believe  it  but  Mr.  Burke. 
It  has  not  the  least  connexion  with  any  part  of  the  transac- 
tion, and  is  totally  foreign  to  every  circumstance  of  it.  The 
bishops  have  never  been  introduced  before  into  any  scene  of 
Mr.  Burke's  drama :  why  then  are  they,  all  at  once,  and 


BIGHTS    OF   MAN.  29 

together,  tout  a  coup  et  tons  ensemble,  introduced  now  ?  Mr. 
Burke  brings  forward  his  bishops  and  his  lantern,  like 
figures  in  a  magic  lantern,  and  raises  his  scenes  by  contrast 
instead  of  connexion.  But  it  serves  to  show  with  the  rest  of 
his  book,  what  little  credit  ought  to  be  given,  where  even 
probability  is  set  at  defiance,  for  the  purpose  of  defaming ; 
and  witli  this  reflection,  instead  of  a  soliloquy  in  praise 
of  chivalry,  as  Mr.  Burke  has  done,  I  close  tne  account 
of  the  expedition  to  Versailles.* 

I  have  now  to  follow  Mr.  Burke  through  a  pathless  wilder- 
ness of  rhapsodies,  and  a  sort  of  descant  upon  governments, 
in  which  he  asserts  whatever  he  pleases,  on  the  presumption 
of  its  being  believed,  without  offering  either  evidence  or 
reasons  foi  so  doing. 

Before  any  thing  can  be  reasoned  upon  to  a  conclusion, 
certain  facts,  principles,  or  data,  to  reason  from,  must  be 
established,  admitted,  or  denied.  Mr.  Burke,  with  his  usual 
outrage,  abuses  the  declaration  of  the  rights  of  man,  pub- 
lished by  the  national  assembly  of  France,  as  the  basis  on 
which  the  constitution  of  France  is  built.  This  he  calls 
'  paltry  and  blurred  sheets  of  paper  about  the  rights  of  man." 
Does  Mr.  Burke  mean  to  deny  that  man  has  any  rights  ?  It 
he  does,  then  he  must  mean  that  there  are  no  such  things  as 
rights  any  where,  and  that  he  has  none  himself ;  for  who  is 
there  in  the  world  but  man  ?  But  if  Mr.  Burke  means  to 
*drnit  that  man  has  rights,  the  question  then  will  be, 
what  are  those  rights,  and  how  came  man  by  them  origi- 
na^y. 

The  error  of  those  who  reason  by  precedents  drawn  from 
antiquity,  respecting  the  rights  of  man,  is,  that  they  do  not 
go  far  enough  into  antiquity.  They  do  not  go  the  whole 
way.  They  stop  in  some  of  the  intermediate  stages  ol  an 
hundred  or  a  thousand  years,  and  produce  what  was  then 
done  as  a  rule  for  the  present  day.  This  is  no  authority  at 
all.  If  we  travel  still  further  into  antiquity,  we  shall  find  a 
directly  contrary  opinion  and  practice  prevailing ;  and,  if 
antiquity  is  to  be  authority,  a  thousand  such  authorities 
may  be  produced,  successively  contradicting  each  other :  but 
if  we  proceed  on,  we  shall  at  last  come  out  right :  we  shall 
come  to  the  time  when  man  came  from  the  hand  of  his 
maker.  What  was  he  then  ?  Man.  Man  was  his  high  and 

*  An  account  of  the  expedition  to  Versailles  may  be  seen  in  No.  18,  of  tb« 
'  Revolution  de  Paris,'  containing  the  events  from  the  3d  to  the  10th  of  Got*- 
b«r,  !*:«. 


30  ROHTS   OF   MAN. 

on!}  tit  .e,  and  a  higher  cannot  be  given  him.  But  of  titles 
i  shall  speak  hereafter. 

"We  have  now  arrived  at  the  origin  of  man,  and  at  the 
origin  of  his  rights.  As  to  the  manner  in  which  the  world 
has  been  governed  from  that  day  to  this,  it  is  no  farther  any 
concern  of  ours  than  to  make  a  proper  use  of  the  errors  or  the 
improvements  which  the  history  of  it  presents.  Those  who 
lived  an  hundred  or  a  thousand  years  ago,  were  then  moderns 
as  we  are  now.  They  had  their  ancients  and  those  ancients 
had  others,  and  we  also  sha'l  be  ancients  in  our  turn.  If 
the  mere  name  of  antiquity  is  to  govern  in  the  affairs  of  life, 
the  people  who  are  to  live  an  hundred  or  a  thousand  years 
hence,  may  as  well  cake  us  for  a  precedent,  as  we  make  a 
precedent  of  those  who  lived  an  hundred  or  a  thousand  years 
ago.  The  fact  is,  that  portions  of  antiquity,  by  proving 
every  thing,  establish  nothing.  It  is  authority  against 
authority  all  the  way,  till  we  come  to  the  divine  origin  of 
the  rights  of  man,  at  the  creation.  Here  our  inquiries  find 
a  resting-place,  and  our  reason  finds  a  home.  If  a  dispute 
about  the  rights  of  man  had  arisen  at  the  distance  of  an 
hundred  years  from  the  creation,  it  is  to  this  source  of 
authority  they  must  have  referred,  and  it  is  to  the  same 
source  of  authority  that  we  must  now  refer. 

Though  I  mean  not  to  touch  upon  any  sectarian  principle 
of  religion,  yet  it  may  be  worth  observing,  that  the  gene- 
alogy of  Christ  is  traced  to  Adam.  Why  then  not  trace  the 
rights  of  man  to  the  creation  of  man  ?  I  will  answer  the 
question.  Because  there  have  been  upstarts  of  govern- 
ment, thrusting  themselves  between,  and  presumptously 
working  to  un-make  man. 

If  any  generation  of  men  ever  possessed  the  right  of  dic- 
tating the  mode  by  which  the  world  should  be  governed  for 
ever,  it  was  the  nrst  generation  that  existed ;  and  if  that 
generation  did  not  do  it,  nj  succeeding  generation  can  show 
any  authority  for  doing  it,  nor  set  any  up.  The  illuminat- 
ing and  divine  principles  of  the  equal  rights  of  man,  (for  it 
has  its  origin  from  the  maker  of  man,)  relates,  not  only  to 
the  living  individuals,  but  to  generations  of  men  succeeding 
each  other.  Every  generation  is  equal  in  rights  to  the  gene- 
rations which  preceded  it,  by  the  same  rule  that  every  in- 
dividual is  born  equal  in  rights  with  his  contemporary. 

Every  history  of  the  creation,  and  every  traditionary 
account,  whether  from  the  lettered  or  unlettered  world,  how- 
ever they  may  vary  in  their  op  nion  or  belief  of  certain  par- 


BIGHTS   OF    MAN.  SI 

ticulars,  all  agree  in  establishing  one  point,  the  unity  of 
man  /  by  which  I  mean  that  man  is  all  of  one  degree,  and 
consequently  that  all  men  are  born  equal,  and  with  equal 
natural  rights,  in  the  same  manner  as  if  posterity  had  been 
continued  oy  creation  instead  of  generation,  the  latter  being; 
only  the  mode  by  which  the  former  is  carried  forward  ;  ana 
consequently,  every  child  born  into  the  world  must  be 
considered  as  deriving  its  existence  from  God.  The  world  is 
as  new  to  him  as  it  was  to  the  first  man  that  existed,  and  his 
natural  right  in  it  is  of  the  same  kind. 

The  Mosaic  account  of  the  creation,  whether  taken  as 
divine  authority,  or  merely  historical,  is  fully  up  to  this 
point,  the  unity  or  equality  of  man.  The  expressions  admit 
of  no  controversy.  "  And  God  said,  let  us  make  man  in  our 
own  image.  In  the  image  of  God  created  he  him ;  male 
and  female  created  he  them."  The  distinction  of  sexes  is 
pointed  out,  but  no  other  distinction  is  even  implied.  If 
this  be  not  divine  authority,  it  is  at  least  historical  authority, 
and  shows  that  the  equality  of  man,  so  far  from  being  a 
modern  doctrine,  is  the  oldest  upon  record. 

It  is  also  to  be  observed,  that  all  the  religions  known  in 
the  world  are  founded,  so  far  as  they  relate  to  man,  on  the 
unity  of  man,  as  being  all  of  one  degree.  Whether  in 
heaven  or  in  hell,  or  in  whatever  state  man  may  be  sup- 
posed to  exist  hereafter,  the  good  and  the  bad  are  the  only 
distinctions.  Nay,  even  the  laws  of  governments  are 
obliged  to  slide  into  this'principle,  by  making  degrees  to 
consist  in  crimes,  and  not  in  persons. 

It  is  one  of  the  greatest  of  all  truths,  a^id  of  the  highest 
advantage  to  cultivate.  By  considering  man  in  this  light, 
and  by  instructing  him  to  consider  himself  in  this  light, 
it  places  him  in  a  close  connexion  with  all  b  is  duties,  whether 
to  his  Creator,  or  to  the  creation,  of  which  he  is  a  part ;  and 
it  is  only  when  he  forgets  his  origin,  or  to  use  a  more  fashion- 
able phrase,  his  birth  and  family,  that  he  becomes  dissolute. 
It  is  not  among  the  least  of  the  evils  of  the  present  existing 
governments  in  all  parts  of  Europe,  that  man,  considered  as 
man,  is  thrown  back  to  a  vast  distance  from  his  maker,  and 
the  artificial  chasm  filled  up  by  a  succession  of  barriers,  or  a 
sort  of  turnpike  gates,  through  which  he  has  to  pass.  I  will 
quote  Mr.  Burke's  catalogue  of  barriers  that  he  has  set  up 
between  man  and  his  Maker.  Putting  himself  in  the  char- 
acter of  a  herald,  he  says — "  We  fear  God — we  look  with 
to  kings — with  affection  to  parliaments — with  duty  to 


32  BIGHTS   OF   MAH. 

magistrates — with  reverence  to  priests,  and  with  respect  to 
nobility."  Mr.  Burke  has  forgot  to  put  in  "  chivalry."  He 
has  also  forgot  to  put  in  Peter. 

The  duty  of  man  is  not  a  wilderness  of  turnpike  gates, 
through  which  he  is  to  pass  by  tickets  from  one  to  the  other. 
It  is  plain  and  simple,  and  consists  but  of  two  points.  His 
duty  to  God,  which  every  man  must  feel ;  and  with  respect 
to  his  neighbor,  to  do  as  he  would  be  done  by.  If  those  to 
whom  power  is  delegated  do  well,  they  will  be  respected ;  if 
not  they  will  be  despised ;  and  with  regard  to  those  to  whom 
no  power  is  delegated,  but  who  assume  it,  the  rational  world 
can  know  nothing  of  them. 

Hitherto  we  have  spoken  only  (and  that  but  in  part)  of 
the  natural  rights  of  man.  We  have  now  to  consider  the 
civil  rights  of  man,  and  to  show  how  the  one  originates  out 
of  the  other.  Man  did  not  enter  into  society  to  become 
worse  than  he  was  before,  nor  to  have  less  rights  than  he 
nad  before,  but  to  have  those  rights  better  secured.  His 
natural  rights  are  the  foundation  of  all  his  civil  rights.  But  in 
order  to  pursue  this  distinction  with  more  precision,  it  is  neces- 
sary to  mark  the  different  qualities  of  natural  and  civil  rights. 

A  few  words  will  explain  this.  Natural  rights  are  those 
which  always  appertain  to  man  in  right  of  his  existence. 
Of  this  kind  are  all  the  intellectual  rights,  or  rights  of  the 
mind,  and  also  all  those  rights  of  acting  as  an  individual 
for  his  own  comfort  and  happiness,  which  are  not  injurious 
to  the  rights  of  others. — Civil  rights  are  those  which  apper- 
tain to  man  in  right  of  his  being  a  member  of  society. 
Every  civil  right  has  for  its  foundation  some  natural  right 
Dre-existing  in  the  individual,  but  to  which  his  individual 
power  is  not,  in  all  cases,  sufficiently  competent.  Of  this 
kind  are  all  those  which  relate  to  security  and  protection. 

From  this  short  review,  it  will  be  easy  to  distinguish  be- 
tween that  class  of  natural  rights  which  man  retains  after 
entering  into  society,  and  those  which  he  throws  into  common 
stock  as  a  member  of  society. 

The  natural  rights  which  he  retains,  are  all  those  in  which 
the  power  to  execute  is  as  perfect  in  the  individual  as  the 
right  itself.  Among  this  class,  as  is  before  mentioned,  are 
all  the  intellectual  rights,  or  rights  of  the  mind ;  conse- 
nuently,  religion  is  one  of  those  rights.  The  natural  rights 
*?hich  are  not  retained,  are  all  those  in  which,  though  the 
right  is  perfect  in  the  individual,  the  power  to  execute  them 
is  defective.  They  answer  not  his  purposes.  A  man  by 


BIGHTS    OF   MAN.  33 

natural  right,  has  a  right  to  judge  in  his  own  cause ;  and  so 
far  as  the  right  of  the  mind  is  concerned,  he  never  surren- 
ders it  •  jut  what  availeth  it  him  to  judge,  if  he  has  not 
power  to  redress  it  ?  He  therefore  deposits  this  right  in  the 
common  stock  of  society,  and  takes  the  arm  of  society,  of 
which  he  is  a  part,  in  preference  and  in  addition  to  his  own. 
Society  grants  him  nothing.  Every  man  is  a  proprietor  in 
society,  and  draws  on  the  capital  as  a  matter  of  right. 

From  these  premises,  two  or  three  certain  conclusions  wil] 
follow. 

1st,  that  every  civil  right  grows  out  of  a  natural  right ;  or, 
in  other  words,  is  a  natural  right  exchanged. 

2d,  That  civil  power  properly  considered  as  such,  is  made 
up  of  the  aggregate  of  that  class  of  the  natural  rights  of 
man,  which  becomes  defective  in  the  individual  in  point  of 
power,  and  answers  not  his  purpose,  but  when  collected  to  a 
focus,  becomes  competent  to  the  purpose  of  every  one. 

3d,  That  the  power  produced  by  the  aggregate  of  natural 
rights,  imperfect  in  power  in  the  individual,  cannot  be  ap- 
plied to  invade  the  natural  rights  which  are  retained  in  tne 
individual,  and  in  which  the  power  to  execute  is  as  perfect 
as  the  right  itself. 

We  have,  now,  in  a  few  words,  traced  man  from  a  natural 
individual  to  a  member  of  society,  and  shown,  or  endeavored 
to  show,  the  quality  of  the  natural  rights  retained,  and  of 
those  which  are  exchanged  for  civil  rights.  Let  us  now 
apply  those  principles  to  government. 

In  casting  our  eyes  over  the  world,  it  is  extremely  easy  to 
distinguish  the  governments  which  have  arisen  out  of  society, 
or  out  of  the  social  compact,  from  those  which  have  not :  but 
to  place  this  in  a  clearer  light  than  a  single  glance  may  aiford, 
it  will  be  proper  to  take  a  review  of  the  several  sources  from 
which  governments  have  arisen,  and  on  which  they  have 
been  founded. 

They  may  be  all  comprehended  under  three  heads — 1st, 
superstition ;  2d,  power ;  3d,  the  common  interests  of  society, 
and  the  common  rights  of  man. 

The  first  was  a  government  of  priest-craft,  the  second  of 
conquerors,  and  the  third  of  reason. 

When  a  set  of  artful  men  pretended,  through  the  medium 
of  oracles,  to  hold  intercourse  with  the  deity,  as  familiarly 
as  they  now  march  up  the  back  stairs  in  European  courts, 
the  world  was  completely  under  the  goverrfment  of  super- 
stition. The  oraclefl  were  consulted,  and  whatever  tne' 


#4  RIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

were  made  to  sa j,  became  the  law  ;  and  this  sort  of  govern- 
ment lasted  just  as  long  as  this  sort  of  superstition  lasted. 

After  these  a  race  of  conquerors  arose,  whose  government, 
like  that  of  William  the  conqueror,  was  founded  on  power, 
and  the  sword  assumed  the  name  of  a  sceptre.  Govern- 
ments thus  established,  last  as  long  as  the  power  to  support 
them  lasts ;  but  that  they  might  avail  themselves  of  every 
engine  in  their  favor,  they  united  fraud  to  force,  and  set  up 
an  idol  which  they  called  divine  right,  and  which,  in  imita- 
tion of  the  pope  who  affects  to  be  spiritual  and  temporal, 
and  in  contradiction  to  the  founder  of  the  Christian  religion, 
twisted  itself  afterwards  into  an  idol  of  another  shape, 
called  church  and  state.  The  key  of  St.  Peter,  and  the 
key  of  the  treasury,  became  quartered  on  one  another,  and 
the  wondering,  cheated  multitude,  worshipped  the  invention. 

When  I  contemplate  the  natural  dignity  of  man :  when  I 
feel  (for  nature  has  not  been  kind  enough  to  me  to  blunt  my 
feelings)  for  the  honor  and  happiness  of  its  character,  I  be- 
come irritated  at  the  attempt  to  govern  mankind  by  force 
and  fraud,  as  if  they  were  all  knaves  and  fools,  and  can 
scarcely  avoid  feeling  disgust  for  those  who  are  thus  im- 
posed upon. 

We  have  now  to  review  the  governments  which  arise  out 
of  society,  in  contradistinction  to  those  which  arose  out  of 
superstition  and  conquest. 

It  has  been  thought  a  considerable  advance  towards  estab- 
lishing the  principles  of  freedom,  to  say,  that  government 
is  a  compact  between  those  who  govern  and  those  who  are 
governed :  but  this  cannot  be  true,  because  it  is  putting  the 
effect  before  the  cause  :  for  as  man  must  have  existed  before 
governments  existed,  there  necessarily  was  a  time  when 
governments  did  not  exist,  and  consequently  there  could 
originally  exist  no  governors  to  form  such  a  compact  with. 
The  fact  therefore  must  be,  that  the  individuals  themselves, 
each  in  his  own  personal  and  sovereign  right,  entered  into 
a  compact  with  each  other,  to  produce  a  government :  and 
this  is  the  only  mode  in  which  governments  have  a  right  to 
be  established  ;  and  the  only  principle  on  which  they  have 
a  right  to  exist. 

To  possess  ourselves  of  a  clear  idea  of  what  government 
is,  or  ought  to,  be,  we  must  trace  it  to  its  origin.  In  doing 
this,  we  shall  easily  discover  that  governments  must  hava 
arisen,  either  out  of  the  people,  or  over  the  people.  Mr. 
Burke  lias  made  no  distinction.  He  investigates  nothing  tc 


BIGHTS   Of   MAJf.  35 

its  source,  and  therefore  lie  confounds  every  thing:  hut  he 
has  signified  his  intention  of  undertaking  at  some  future 
opportunity,  a  comparison  between  the  constitutions  of 
England  and  France.  As  he  thus  renders  it  a  subject  of 
controversy  by  throwing  the  gauntlet,  I  take  him  up  on  his 
own  ground.  It  IB  in  high  challenges  that  high  truths  have 
the  light  of  appearing ;  and  I  accept  it  with  the  more 
readiness,  because  it  affords  me,  at  the  same  time,  an  oppor- 
tunity of  pursuing  the  subject  with  respect  to  governments 
arising  out  of  society. 

But  it  will  be  first  necessary  to  define  what  is  meant  by  a 
constitution.  It  is  not  sufficient  that  we  adopt  the  word  ; 
we  must  fix  also  a  standard  signification  to  it. 

A  constitution  is  not  a  thing  in  name  only,  but  in  fact. 
It  has  not  an  ideal,  but  a  real  existence ;  and  wherever  it 
cannot  be  produced  in  a  visible  form,  there  is  none.  A 
constitution  is  a  thing  antecedent  to  a  government,  and  a 
government  is  only  the  creature  of  a  constitution.  The  con- 
stitution of  a  country  is  not  the  act  of  its  government,  but 
of  the  people  constituting  a  government.  It  is  the  body  of 
elements,  to  which  you  can  refer,  and  quote  article  by  ar- 
ticle ;  and  contains  the  principles  on  which  the  government 
shall  be  established,  the  form  in  which  it  shall  be  organized, 
the  powers  it  shall  have,  the  mode  of  elections,  the  duration 
of  parliaments,  or  by  whatever  name  such  bodies  may  be 
called  ;  the  powers  which  the  executive  part  of  the  govern- 
ment shall  have  ;  and,  in  fine,  every  thing  that  relates  to  the 
complete  organization  of  a  civil  government,  and  the  prin- 
ciple on  which  it  shall  act,  and  by  which  it  shall  be  bound. 
A  constitution,  therefore  is  to  a  government,  what  the  laws 
made  afterwards  by  that  government  are  to  a  court  of  judi- 
cature. The  court  of  judicature  does  not  make  laws,  neither 
can  it  alter  them ;  it  only  acts  in  conformity  to  the  laws 
made ;  and  the  government  is  in  like  manner  governed  by 
the  constitution. 

Can  then  Mr.  Burke  produce  the  English  constitution  ? 
If  he  cannot,  we  may  fairly  conclude,  that  though  it  has 
been  so  much  talked  about,  no  such  thing  as  a  constitution 
exists,  or  ever  did  exist,  and  consequently  the  people  have 
yet  a  constitution  to  form. 

Mr.  Burke  will  not,  I  presume,  deny  the  position  I  have 
already  advanced ;  namely,  that  governments  arise  either 
out  of  the  people,  or  over  the  people.  The  English  govern- 
ment is  one  of  those  which  arose  out  of  a  conquest,  and  not 


36  RIGHTS  £>F   MAN. 

out  of  society,  and  consequently  it  arose  over  the  people : 
and  though  it  has  been  much  modified  from  the  opportunity 
of  circumstances,  since  the  time  of  William  the  conqueror, 
the  country  has  never  yet  regenerated  itself,  and  it  is  there- 
fore without  a  constitution. 

I  readily  perceive  the  reason  why  Mr.  Burke  declined 
going  into  the  comparison  between  the  English  and  the 
French  constitutions,  because  he  could  not  but  perceive,  when 
lie  sat  down  to  the  task,  that  no  constitution  was  in  exist- 
ence on  his  side  of  the  question.  His  book  is  certainly 
bulky  enough  to  have  contained  all  he  could  say  on  this 
subject,  and  it  would  have  been  the  best  manner  in  which 
people  could  have  judged  of  their  separate  merits.  Why 
then  has  he  declined  the  only  thing  that  was  worth  while  ta 
write  upon  ?  It  was  the  strongest  ground  he  could  take,  if 
the  advantages  were  on  his  side  ;  but  the  weakest  if  they 
were  not ;  and  his  declining  to  take  it,  is  either  a  sign  that 
he  could  not  possess  it,  or  could  not  maintain  it. 

Mr.  Burke  has  said  in  his  speech  last  winter  in  parlia- 
ment, that  when  the  national  assembly  of  France  first  met 
in  three  orders,  (the  tiers  etats,  the  clergy,  and  the  noblesse) 
•iliat  France  had  then  a  good  constitution.  This  shows,  among 
Humorous  other  instances,  that  Mr.  Burke  does  not  under- 
stand what  a  constitution  is.  The  persons  so  met,  were  not 
a  constitution,  but  a  convention  to  make  a  constitution. 

The  present  national  assembly  of  France  is,  strictly  speak- 
ing, the  personal  social  compact.  The  members  of  it  are  the 
delegates  of  the  nation  in  its  original  character ;  future 
assemblies  will  be  the  delegates  of  the  nation  in  its  organized 
character.  The  authority  of  the  present  assembly  is  differ- 
ent to  what  the  authority  of  future  assemblies  will  be.  The 
authority  of  the  present  one  is  to  form  a  constitution :  the 
authority  of  future  assemblies  will  be  to  legislate  according 
to  the  principles  and  forms  prescribed  in  that  constitution  ; 
and  if  experience  should  hereafter  show  that  alterations, 
amendments,  or  additions  are  necessary,  the  constitution  will 
point  out  the  mode  by  which  such  things  shall  be  done,  and 
not  leave  it  to  the  discretionary  power  of  the  future  govern- 
ment. 

A  government  on  the  principles  on  which  constitutional 

governments,  arising  out  of  society,  are  established,  cannot 
ave  the  right  of  altering  itself.     If  it  had,  it  would  be  arbi- 
trary.    It  might  make  itself  what  it  pleased ;  and  wherever 
euch  a  right  is  set  up,  it  shows  that  there  is  no  constitution. 


BIGHTS   OF   MAJff.  37 

The  act  by  which  the  English  parliament  empowered  itself 
to  sit  for  seven  years,  shows  there  is  no  constitution  in  Eng- 
land. It  might,  by  the  same  self  authority,  have  sat  any 
greater  number  of  years  or  for  life.  The  bill  which  the 
present  Mr.  Pitt  brought  into  parliament  some  years  ago, 
to  reform  parliament,  was  on  the  same  erroneous  principle. 

The  right  of  reform  is  in  the  nation  in  its  original  character, 
and  the  constitutional  method  would  be  by  a  general  con- 
vention elected  for  the  purpose.  There  is  moreover  a  para- 
dox in  the  idea  of  vitiated  bodies  reforming  themselves. 

From  these  preliminaries  I  proceed  to  draw  some  com- 
parisons. I  have  already  spoken  of  the  declaration  of  rights ; 
and  as  I  mean  to  be  as  concise  as  possible,  I  shall  proceed 
to  other  parts  of  the  French  constitution. 

The  constitution  of  France  says,  that  every  man  who  pays 
a  tax  of  sixty  sous  per  annum  (2s.  and  6a.  English)  is  an 
elector.  What  article  will  Mr.  Burke  place  against  this  ? 
Can  any  thing  be  more  limited,  and  at  the  same  time  more 
capricious,  than  what  the  qualifications  of  the  electors  are  in 
England  ?  Limited — because  not  one  man  in  a  hundred  (I 
speak  much  within  compass)  is  admitted  to  vote :  capricious — 
because  the  lowest  character  that  can  be  supposed  to  exist, 
and  who  has  not  so  much  as  the  visible  means  of  an  honest 
livelihood,  is  an  elector  in  some  places ;  while,  in  other 
places,  the  man  who  pays  very  large  taxes,  and  with  a  fair 
known  character,  and  the  farmer  who  rents  to  the  amount  of 
three  or  four  hundred  pounds  a  year,  and  with  a  property  on 
that  farm  to  three  or  mur  times  that  amount,  is  not  admit- 
ted to  be  an  elector.  Every  thing  is  out  of  nature,  as  Mr. 
Burke  says  on  another  occasion,  in  this  strange  chaos,  and  all 
sorts  of  follies  are  blended  with  all  sorts  of  crimes.  William 
the  conqueror,  and  his  descendants,  parcelled  out  the  country 
in  this  manner,  and  bribed  one  part  of  it  by  what  they  called 
charters,  to  hold  the  other  parts  of  it  the  better  subjected  to 
their  will.  This  is  the  reason  why  so  many  charters  abound 
in  Cornwall.  The  people  were  averse  to  the  government 
established  at  the  conquest,  and  the  towns  were  garrisoned 
and  bribed  to  enslave  the  country.  All  the  old  charters  are 
the  badges  of  this  conquest,  and  it  is  from  this  source  that 
the  capriciousness  of  election  arises. 

The  French  constitution  says,  that  the  number  of  represen- 
tatives for  any  place  shall  Toe  in  a  ratio  to  the  number  of 
taxable  inhabitants  or  electors.  Wliat  article  will  Mr.  Burke 
place  against  this  ?  The  county  of  Yorkshire ,  which  con- 


88  BIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

tains  near  a  million  of  souls,  sends  two  county  members ; 
and  so  does  the  county  of  Rutland,  which  contains  not  a 
hundredth  part  of  that  number.  The  town  of  old  Sarum, 
which  contains  not  three  houses,  sends  two  members ;  and 
the  town  of  Manchester,  which  contains  upwards  of  sixty 
thousand  souls,  is  not  admitted  to  send  any.  Is  there  any 
principle  in  these  things  ?  Is  there  any  thing  by  which  you 
can  trace  the  marks  of  freedom  or  discover  those  of  wisdom  ? 
No  wonder  then  Mr.  Burke  has  declined  the  comparison, 
and  endeavoured  to  lead  his  readers  from  the  point,  by  a  wild 
unsystematical  display  of  paradoxical  rhapsodies. 

The  French  constitution  says,  that  the  national  assembly 
shall  be  elected  every  two  years.  What  article  will  Mr. 
Burke  place  against  this  ?  Why,  that  the  nation  has  no 
right  at  all  in  the  case :  that  the  government  is  perfectly 
arbitrary  with  respect  to  this  point ;  and  he  can  quote  for 
his  authority,  the  precedent  of  a  former  parliament. 

The  French  constitution  says,  there  shall  be  no  game 
laws ;  that  the  farmer  on  whose  lands  wild  game  shall  be 
found  (for  it  is  by  the  produce  of  those  lands  they  are  fed) 
shall  have  a  right  to  what  he  can  take.  That  there  shall 
be  no  monopolies  of  any  kind,  that  all  trades  shall  be  free, 
and  every  man  free  to  follow  any  occupation  by  which  he 
can  procure  an  honest  livelihood,  and  in  any  place,  town,  or 
city,  throughout  the  nation.  What  will  Mr.  Burke  say  to 
this  ?  In  England,  game  is  made  the  property  of  those  at 
whose  expense  it  is  not  fed  ;  and  with  respect  to  monopolies, 
the  country  is  cut  up  into  monopolies.  Every  chartered 
town  is  an  aristocratic  monopoly  in  itself,  and  the  qualifica- 
tion of  electors  proceeds  out  of  those  chartered  monopolies. 
Is  this  freedom  f  Is  this  what  Mr.  Burke  means  by  a  con- 
stitution ? 

In  these  chartered  monopolies  a  man  coming  from  another 
part  of  the  country,  is  hunted  from  them  as  if  he  were  a 
foreign  enemy.  An  Englishman  is  not  free  in  his  own  coun- 
try :  every  one  of  those  places  presents  a  barrier  in  his  way, 
and  tells  him  he  is  not  a  freeman — that  he  has  no  rights. 
Within  these  monopolies,  are  other  monopolies.  In  a  city, 
such  for  instance  as  Bath,  which  contains  between  twenty 
and  thirty  thousand  inhabitants,  the  right  of  electing  repre- 
sentatives to  parliament  is  monopolized  into  about  thirty-one 
persons.  And  within  these  monopolies  are  still  others.  A 
man,  even  of  the  same  town,  whose  parents  were  not  in  cir- 
cumstances to  give  him  an  occupation,  is  debarred,  in  many 


RIGHTS   OF   MAN.  89 

cases,  from  the  natural  right  of  acquiring  one,  be  his  genhii 
or  industry  what  it  may. 

Are  these  things  examples  to  hold  out  to  a  country  regen- 
erating itself  from  slavery,  like  France  ?  Certainly  they  are 
not ;  and  certain  am  I,  that  when  the  people  of  England 
come  to  reflect  upon  them,  they  will,  like  France,  annihilate 
those  badges  of  ancient  oppression,  those  traces  of  a  con- 
quered nation.  Had  Mr.  Burke  possessed  talents  similar  to 
the  author  "  On  the  Wealth  of  J^ations,"  he  would  have 
comprehended  all  the  parts  which  enter  into,  and,  by  assem- 
blage, form  a  constitution.  He  would  have  reasoned  from 
minutiae  to  magnitude.  It  is  not  from  his  prejudices  only, 
but  from  the  disorderly  cast  of  his  genius,  that  he  is  unfitted 
for  the  subject  he  writes  upon.  Even  his  genius  is  without 
a  constitution.  It  is  a  genius  at  random,  and  not  a  genius 
constituted.  But  he  must  say  something — He  has  therefore 
mounted  in  the  air  like  a  balloon,  to  draw  the  eyes  of  the 
multitude  from  the  ground  they  stand  upon. 

Much  is  to  be  learned  from  the  French  constitution.  Con- 
quest and  tyranny  transplanted  themselves  with  "William  the 
conqueror,  from  Normandy  into  England,  and  the  country 
is  yet  disfigured  with  the  marks.  May  then  the  example  of 
all  France  contribute  to  regenerate  the  freedom  which  a 
province  of  it  destroyed  ! 

The  French  constitution  says,  that  to  preserve  the  national 
representation  from  being  corrupt,  no  member  of  the  national 
assembly  shall  be  an  officer  of  government,  a  placeman  or  a 
penuioner.  What  will  Mr.  Burke  place  against  this?  I 
will  whisper  his  answer :  loaves  and  fishes.  Ah !  this  gov- 
ernmont  of  loaves  and  fishes  has  more  mischief  in  it  than 
people  have  yet  reflected  on.  The  national  assembly  ha? 
made  the  discovery,  and  holds  out  an  example  to  the  world. 
Had  governments  agreed  to  quarrel  on  purpose  to  fleece 
their  countries  by  taxes,  they  could  not  have  succeeded  bet 
ter  than  they  have  done. 

Every  thing  in  the  English  government  appears  to  me  the 
reverse  of  what  it  ought  to  be,  and  of  what  it  is  said  to  be- 
The  parliament,  imperfectly  and  capriciously  elected  as  it 
is,  is  nevertheless  supposed  to  hold  the  national  purse  in  trust 
for  the  nation  ;  but  in  the  manner  in  which  an  English  par- 
liament is  constructed,  it  is  like  a  man  being  both  mortgager 
and  mortgagee :  and  in  the  case  of  misapplication  of  trust, 
it  is  the  criminal  sitting  in  judgment  on  himself.  If  those 
persons  who  vote  the  supplies  are  the  same  persons  who  re- 


40  BIGHTS    OF   MAN. 

ceive  the  supplies  when  voted,  and  are  to  account  for  the 
expenditure  of  those  supplies  to  those  who  voted  them,  it  ia 
themselves  accountable  to  themselves,  and  the  Comedy  of 
Errors  concludes  with  the  pantomime  of  Hush.  Neither 
the  ministerial  party,  nor  the  opposition  will  touch  upon 
this  case.  The  national  purse  is  the  common  hack  which 
each  mounts  upon.  It  is  like  what  the  country  people  call, 
"  Ride  and  tie — You  ride  a  little  way  and  then  I.  They 
order  these  things  better  in  France. 

The  French  constitution  says,  that  the  right  of  war  and 
peace  is  in  the  nation.  Where  else  should  it  reside,  but  in 
those  who  are  to  pay  the  expense  ? 

In  England  the  right  is  said  to  reside  in  a  metaphor, 
shown  at  the  tower  for  sixpence  or  a  shilling  a-piece ;  so  are 
the  lions ;  and  it  would  be  a  step  nearer  to  reason  to  say 
it  resided  in  them,  for  any  inanimate  metaphor  is  no  more 
than  a  hat  or  a  cap.  We  can  all  see  the  absurdity  of  wor- 
shipping Aaron's  molten  calf,  or  Nebuchadnezzar's  golden 
image ;  but  why  do  men  continue  to  practise  on  themselves 
the  absurdities  they  despise  in  others? 

It  may  with  reason  be  said,  that  in  the  manner  the  Englisl 
nation  is  represented,  it  matters  not  where  this  right  resides, 
whether  in  the  crown  or  in  the  parliament.  War  is  the 
common  harvest  of  all  those  who  participate  in  the  division 
and  expenditure  of  public  money,  in  all  countries.  It  is  the 
art  of  conquering  at  home:  the  object  of  it  is  an  increase 
of  revenue :  and  as  revenue  cannot  be  increased  without 
taxes,  a  pretence  must  be  made  for  expenditures.  In  re- 
viewing the  history  of  the  English  government,  its  wars  and 
taxes,  an  observer,  not  blinded  by  prejudice,  nor  warped  by 
interest,  would  declare  that  taxes  were  not  raised  to  carry 
on  wars,  but  that  wars  were  raised  to  carry  on  taxes. 

Mr.  Burke,  as  a  member  of  the  house  of  commons,  is  a 
part  of  the  English  government ;  and  though  he  professes 
himself  an  enemy  to  war,  he  abuses  the  French  constitution, 
which  seeks  to  explode  it.  He  holds  up  the  English  govern- 
ment as  a  model  in  all  its  parts,  to  France ;  but  he  should 
first  know  the  remarks  which  the  French  make  upon  it. 
They  contend,  in  favor  of  their  own,  that  the  portion  of  lib 
erty  enjoyed  in  England,  is  just  enough  to  enslave  a  coun- 
try by,  more  productively  than  by  despotism  ;  and  that  as 
the  real  object  of  a  despotism  is  revenue,  a  government  so 
formed  obtains  more  than  it  could  either  by  direct  despotism 
JIT  in  a  full  state  of  freedom,  and  is,  therefore,  on  the  ground 


RIGHTS   OF   MAN.  41 

of  interest,  opposed  to  both.  They  account  also  for  the 
readiness  which  always  appears  in  such  governments  for  en- 
gaging in  wars,  by  remarking  on  the  different  motives  which 
produce  them.  In  despotic  governments,  wars  are  the  effects 
of  pride  ;  but  in  those  governments  in  which  they  become 
the  means  of  taxation,  they  acquire  thereby  a  more  perma- 
nent promptitude. 

The  French  constitution,  therefore,  to  provide  against  both 
those  evils,  has  taken  away  from  kings  and  ministers  the 
power  of  declaring  war,  and  placed  the  right  where  the  ex- 
pense must  fall. 

When  the  question  on  the  right  of  war  and  peace  was 
agitating  in  the  national  assembly,  the  people  of  England 
appeared  to  be  much  interested  in  the  event,  and  highly  to 
applaud  the  decision.  As  a  principle,  it  applies  as  mucn  to 
one  country  as  to  another.  WilKam  the  conqueror,  as  a 
conqueror,  held  this  power  of  war  and  peace  in  himself,  and 
his  descendants  have  ever  since  claimed  it  as  a  right. 

Although  Mr.  Burke  has  asserted  the  right  of  the  parlia- 
ment at  the  revolution  to  bind  and  control  the  nation  and 
posterity  for  ever,  he  denies  at  the  same  time,  that  the  par- 
liament or  the  nation  has  any  right  to  alter,  what  he  calls, 
the  succession  of  the  crown,  in  any  thing  but  in  part,  or  by 
a  sort  of  modification.  By  his  taking  this  ground,  he  throws 
the  case  back  to  the  Norman  conquest :  and  by  thus  running 
a  line  of  succession,  springing  from  William  the  conqueror 
to  the  present  day,  he  makes  it  necessary  to  inquire  who  and 
what  W  illiam  the  conqueror  was,  and  where  he  came  from : 
and  into  the  origin,  history  and  nature  of  what  are  called 
prerogatives.  Every  thing  must  have  had  a  beginning,  and 
the  fog  of  time  and  of  antiquity  should  be  penetrated  to 
discover  it.  Let  then  Mr.  Burke  bring  forward  his  William 
of  Normandy,  for  it  is  to  this  origin  that  his  argument  goes. 
It  also  unfortunately  happens  in  running  this  line  of  suc- 
cession, that  another  line,  parallel  thereto,  presents  itself, 
which  is,  that  if  the  succession  runs  in  a  line  of  the  con- 
quest, the  nation  runs  in  a  line  of  being  conquered,  and  it 
ought  to  rescue  itself  from  this  reproach. 

But  it  will  perhaps  be  said,  that  though  the  power  of  de- 
claring war  descends  into  the  heritage  of  the  conquest,  it  is 
held  in  check  by  the  right  of  the  parliament  to  withhold  the 
supplies.  It  will  always  happen,  when  a  thing  is  originally 
wrong,  that  amendments  do  not  make  it  right,  ana  often 
happens  that  they  do  as  much  mischief  one  way  as  good 


42  EIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

the  other ;  and  *'ich  is  the  case  here,  for  if  the  one  rashly  de* 
clares  war  as  a  matter  of  right,  and  the  other  peremptorily 
withholds  the  supplies  as  a  matter  of  right,  the  remedy  be- 
comes as  bad  or  worse  than  the  disease.  The  one  forces  the 
nation  to  a  combat,  and  the  other  ties  its  hands ;  but  the 
more  probable  issue  is,  that  the  contrast  will  end  in  a  collu- 
sion between  the  parties,  and  be  made  a  screen  to  both. 

On  this  question  of  war,  three  things  are  to  be  considered ; 
1st,  the  right  of  declaring  it ;  2d,  the  expense  of  supporting 
it ;  3d,  the  mode  of  conducting  it  after  it  is  declared.  The 
French  constitution  places  the  right  where  the  expense  must 
fall,  and  this  union  can  be  only  in  the  nation.  The  mode 
of  conducting  it,  after  it  is  declared,  it  consigns  to  the  exe- 
cutive department.  Were  this  the  case  in  all  countries,  we 
should  hear  but  little  more  of  wars. 

Before  I  proceed  to  consider  other  parts  of  the  French 
constitution,  and  by  way  of  relieving  the  fatigue  of 
argument,  I  will  introduce  an  anecdote  which  I  had  from 
Dr.  Franklin. 

While  the  doctor  resided  in  France,  as  Minister  from 
America,  during  the  war,  he  had  numerous  proposals  made 
to  him  by  projectors  of  every  country  and  of  every  kind, 
who  wished  to  go  to  the  land  that  floweth  with  milk  and 
honey,  America,  and  among  the  rest,  there  was  one  who 
offered  himself  to  be  king.  He  introduced  his  proposal  to 
the  doctor  by  letter,  which  is  now  in  the  hands  of  M.  Beau- 
marchais,  of  Paris — stating,  first,  that  as  the  Americans  had 
dismissed  or  sent  away  their  kingr,  they  would  want  another. 
Secondly,  that  himself  was  a  Norman.  Thirdly,  that  he 
was  of  a  more  ancient  family  than  the  dukes  of  Normandy, 
and  of  a  more  honorable  descent,  his  line  never  having  been 
bastardized.  Fourthly,  that  there  was  already  a  precedent 
in  England,  of  kings  coming  out  of  Normandy ;  and  on 
these  grounds  he  rested  his  offer,  enjoining  that  the  doctor 
would  forward  it  to  America.  But  as  the  doctor  did  not  do 
this,  nor  yet  send  him  an  answer,  the  projector  wrote  a 
second  letter  ;  in  which  he  did  not,  it  is  true,  threaten  to  go 
over  and  conquer  America,  but  only,  with  great  dignity, 
proposed,  that  if  his  offer  was  not  accepted,  that  an  acknow- 
ledgment of  about  30,OOOZ.  might  be  made  to  him  for  hia 
generosity !  Now,  as  all  arguments  respecting  succession 
must  necessarily  connect  that  succession  with  some  begin- 
ning, Mr.  Burke's  arguments  on  this  subject  go  to  show,  that 
there  is  no  English  origin  of  kings,  and  that  they  are  de- 


MGIIT8   OF   MAN.  43 

scendants  of  the  Norman  line  in  right  of  the  conquest.  It 
may,  therefore,  be  of  service  to  his  doctrine  to  make  the 
Btory  known,  and  to  inform  him,  that  in  case  of  that  natural 
extinction  to  which  all  mortality  is  subject,  kings  may  again 
be  had  from  Normandy,  on  more  reasonable  terms  tnan 
William  the  conqueror ;  and,  consequently,  that  the  good 

Seople  of  England,  at  the  revolution  of  1688,  might  have 
one  much  better,  had  such  a  generous  Norman  as  this 
known  their  wants,  and  they  his.  The  chivalric  character 
which  Mr.  Burke  so  much  admires,  is  certainly  much  easier 
to  make  a  bargain  with  than  a  hard  dealing  Dutchman.  But 
to  return  to  the  matters  of  the  constitution — 

The  French  constitution  says,  there  shall  be  no  titles  ;  and 
of  consequence,  all  that  class  of  equivocal  generation,  which 
in  some  countries  is  called  "  aristocracy"  and  in  others 
"  nobility"  is  done  away,  and  the  peer  is  exalted  into  the 
man. 

Titles  are  but  nicknames,  and  every  nickname  is  a  title. 
The  thing  is  perfectly  harmless  in  itself,  but  it  marks  a  sort 
of  foppery  in  the  human  character  which  degrades  it.  It 
renders  man  diminutive  in  things  which  are  great,  and  the 
counterfeit  of  woman  in  things  which  are  little.  It  talks 
about  its  fine  riband  like  a  girl,  and  shows  its  garter  like  a 
child.  A  certain  writer,  of  some  antiquity,  says,  "  When  I 
was  a  child,  I  thought  as  a  child  ;  but  when  I  became  a  man, 
I  put  away  childish  things." 

It  is,  properly,  from  the  elevated  mind  of  France,  that  the 
folly  of  titles  Las  been  abolished.  It  has  out-grown  the 
baby-clothes  of  count  and  duke,  and  breeched  itself  in  man- 
hood. France  has  not  levelled,  it  has  exalted.  It  has  put 
down  the  dwarf  to  set  up  the  man.  The  insignificance  of  a 
senseless  word  like  duke,  count,  or  earl,  has  ceased  to  please. 
Even  those  who  possessed  them  have  disowned  the  gibber- 
ish, and,  as  they  outgrew  the  rickets,  have  despised  the 
rattle.  The  genuine  mind  of  man,  thirsting  for  its  native 
home,  society,  contemns  the  gew-gaws  that  separate  him 
from  it.  Titles  are  like  circles  drawn  by  the  magician's 
wand,  to  contract  the  sphere  of  man's  felicity.  He  lives 
immured  within  the  Bastile  of  a  word,  and  surveys  at  a  dis- 
tance the  envied  life  of  man. 

Is  it  then  any  wonder  that  titles  should  fall  in  France  ? 
Is  it  not  a  greater  wonder  they  should  be  kept  up  any  where  I 
What  are  they?  What  is  their  worth,  nay  "  what  is  their 
amount  ?"  When  we  think  or  speak  of  a  judge,  or  a 


EIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

ral,  we  associate  with  it  the  ideas  of  office  and  character  ;• 
we  think  of  gravity  in  the  one,  and  bravery  in  the  other ; 
but  when  we  use  a  word  merely  as  a  title,  no  ideas  associate 
with  it.  Through  all  the  vocabulary  of  Adam,  there  is  not 
such  an  animal  as  a  duke  or  a  count ;  neither  can  we  con- 
nect any  certain  idea  to  the  words.  Whether  they  mean 
strength  or  weakness,  wisdom  or  folly,  a  child  or  a  man,  or 
a  rider  or  a  horse,  is  all  equivocal.  What  respect  then  can 
be  paid  to  that  which  describes  nothing,  and  which  means 
nothing?  Imagination  has  given  figure  and  character  to 
centaurs,  satyrs,  and  down  to  all  the  fairy  tribe ;  but  titles 
baffle  even  the  powers  of  fancy,  and  are  a  chimerical  non- 
descript. 

But  this  is  not  all — If  a  whole  country  is  disposed  to  hold 
them  in  contempt,  all  their  value  is  gone,  and  none  will  own 
them.  It  is  common  opinion  only  that  makes  them  any 
thing  or  nothing,  or  worse  than  nothing.  There  is  no  occa- 
sion to  take  titles  away,  for  they  take  themselves  away  when 
society  concurs  to  ridicule  them.  This  species  of  imaginary 
consequence  has  visibly  declined  in  every  part  of  Europe, 
and  it  hastens  to  its  exit  as  the  world  of  reason  continues  tc 
rise.  There  was  a  time  when  the  lowest  class  of  what  are 
called  nobility,  was  more  thought  of  than  the  highest  is 
now,  and  when  a  man  in  armor  riding  through  Christendom 
in  search  of  adventures  was  more  stared  at  than  a  modern 
duke.  The  world  has  seen  this  folly  fall,  and  it  has  fallen 
by  being  laughed  at,  and  the  farce  of  titles  will  follow  its 
fate.  The  patriots  of  France  have  discovered  in  good  time, 
that  rank  and  dignity  in  society  must  take  a  new  ground. 
The  old  one  has  fallen  through.  It  must  now  take  the  sub- 
stantial ground  of  character,  instead  of  the  chimerical  ground 
of  titles :  and  they  have  brought  their  titles  to  the  altar,  and 
made  of  them  a  burnt-offering  to  reason. 

If  no  mischief  has  annexed  itself  to  the  folly  of  titles,  they 
would  not  have  been  worth  a  serious  and  formal  destruction, 
such  as  the  national  assembly  have  decreed  them :  and  this 
makes  it  necessary  to  inquire  further  into  the  nature  and 
character  of  aristocracy. 

That,  then,  which  is  called  aristocracy  in  some  countries, 
and  nobility  in  others,  arose  out  of  the  governments  founded 
upon  conquest.  It  was  originally  a  military  order,  for  thft 
purpose  01  supporting  military  government ;  (for  such  were 
all  governments  founded  in  conquests)  and  to  keep  up  a 
*uccession  of  this  order  for  the  purpose  for  which  it  waa 


RIGHTS   OF   MAN.  46 

established,  all  the  younger  branches  of  those  families  were 
disinherited,  and  the  law  of  primogenitureship  set  up. 

The  nature  and  character  of  aristocracy  shows  itself  to  us 
in  this  law.  It  is  a  law  against  every  law  of  nature,  and 
nature  herself  calls  for  its  destruction.  Establish  family 
justice  and  aristocracy  falls.  By  the  aristocratical  law  of 
primogenitureship,  in  a  family  of  six  children,  five  are  ex- 
posed.— Aristocracy  has  never  but  one  child.  The  rest  are 
begotten  to  be  devoured.  They  are  thrown  to  the  cannibal 
for  prey,  and  the  natural  parent  prepares  the  unnatural 
repast. 

As  every  thing  which  is  out  of  nature  in  man,  affects, 
more  or  less,  the  interest  of  society,  so  does  this.  All  the 
children  which  the  aristocracy  disowns  (which  are  all,  except 
the  eldest)  are,  in  general,  cast  like  orphans  on  a  parish,  to 
be  provided  for  by  the  public,  but  at  a  greater  charge.  Un- 
mecessary  offices  and  places  in  governments  and  courts  are 
created  at  the  expense  of  the  public  to  maintain  them. 

With  what  kind  of  parental  reflections  can  the  father  or 
mother  contemplate  their  younger  offspring.  By  nature 
they  are  children,  and  by  marriage  they  are  heirs ;  but  by 
aristocracy  they  are  bastards  and  orphans.  They  are  the 
flesh  and  blood  of  their  parents  in  one  line,  and  nothing  akin 
to  them  in  the  other.  To  restore,  therefore,  parents  to  their 
children,  and  children  to  their  parents — relations  to  each 
other,  and  man  to  society — and  to  exterminate  the  monster 
aristocracy,  root  and  branch — the  French  constitution  has 
destroyed  the  law  of primogenitureship..  Here  then  lies  the 
monster,  and  Mr.  Burke,  if  he  pleases,  may  write  its  epitaph. 

Hitherto  we  have  considered  aristocracy  chiefly  in  one 
point  of  view.  We  have  now  to  consider  it  in  another. 
But  whether  we  view  it  before  or  behind,  or  side  ways,  or 
any  way  else,  domestically  or  publicly,  it  is  still  a  monster. 

In  France,  aristocracy  had  one  feature  less  in  its  coun- 
tenance than  what  it  has  in  some  other  countries.  It  did 
not  compose  a  body  of  hereditary  legisl  ators.  It  was  not  "  a 
corporation  of  aristocracy"  for  such  1  have  heard  M.  de  la 
Fayette  describe  an  English  house  of  peers.  Let  us  then 
examine  the  grounds  upon  which  the  French  constitution 
has  resolved  against  having  such  a  house  in  France. 

Because,  in  the  first  place,  as  is  already  mentioned,  aris- 
tocracy is  kept  up  by  family  tyranny  and  injustice. 

2nd,  Because  there  is  an  unnatural  unfitness  in  an  aris- 
tocracy to  be  legislators  for  a  nation.  Their  ideas  of  distri- 


46  EIGHTS    OB    MAN. 

butwe  justice  are  corrupted  at  the  very  source.  They  Degin 
life  trampling  on  all  their  younger  brothers  and  sisters,  and 
relations  of  every  kind,  and  are  taught  and  educated  so  to 
do.  With  what  ideas  of  justice  or  honor  can  that  man 
enter  a  house  of  legislation,  who  absorbs  in  his  own  person 
the  inheritance  of  a  whole  family  of  children,  or  metes  out 
some  pitiful  portion  with  the  insolence  of  a  gift  ? 

3d,  Because  the  idea  of  hereditary  legislators  is  as  incon- 
sistent as  that  of  hereditary  judges,  or  hereditary  juries ;  and 
as  absurd  as  an  hereditary  mathematician,  or  an  hereditary 
wise  man  ;  and  as  ridiculous  as  an  hereditary  poet-laureat. 

4th,  Because  a  body  of  men,  holding  themselves  account- 
able to  nobody,  ought  not  to  be  trusted  by  any  body. 

5th,  Because  it  is  continuing  the  uncivilized  principle  of 
governments  founded  in  conquest,  and  the  base  idea  of 
man  having  property  in  man,  and  governing  him  by  per- 
sonal right. 

6th,  Because  aristocracy  has  a  tendency  to  degenerate  the 
human  species.  By  the  universal  economy  of  nature  it  is 
known,  and  by  the  instance  of  the  Jews  it  is  proved,  that 
the  human  species  has  a  tendency  to  degenerate,  in  any 
small  number  of  persons,  when  separated  from  the  general 
stock  of  society,  and  intermarrying  constantly  with  each 
other.  It  defeats  even  its  pretended  end,  and  becomes  in 
time  the  opposite  of  what  is  noble  in  man.  Mr.  Burke  talks 
of  nobility ;  let  him  show  what  it  is.  The  greatest  charac- 
ters the  world  has  known,  have  rose  on  the  democratic  floor. 
Aristocracy  has  not  been  able  to  keep  a  proportionate  pace 
with  democracy.  The  artificial  noble  shrinks  into  a  dwarf 
before  the  noble  of  nature ;  and  in  a  few  instances  (for  there 
are  some  in  all  countries)  in  whom  nature,  as  by  a  miracle, 
has  survived  in  aristocracy,  those  men  despise  it.  But  it  is 
time  to  proceed  to  a  new  subject. 

The  French  constitution  has  reformed  the  condition  of  the 
clergy.  It  has  raised  the  income  of  the  lower  and  middle 
classes,  and  taken  from  the  higher.  None  are  now  less  than 
twelve  hundred  livres,  (fifty  pounds  sterling)  nor  any  highei 
than  two  or  three  thousana  pounds.  What  will  Mr.  Burke 
place  against  this  ?  Hear  what  he  says. 

He  says,  that  "  the  people  of  England  can  see,  without 
pain  or  grudging,  an  archbishop  precede  a  duke  ;  they  can 
see  a  bishop  of  Durham,  or  a  bishop  of  Winchester  in  posses- 
sion of  10,OOOZ.  a-year ;  and  cannot  see  why  it  is  in  worse 
hands  than  estates  to  the  like  amount  in  the  hands  of  tbi* 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN.  47 

eari  or  that  'squire."  And  Mr.  Burke  offers  this  as  an  ex> 
ample  to  France. 

As  to  the  first  part,  whether  the  archbishop  precedes  the 
duke,  or  the  duke  the  bishop,  it  is,  I  believe,  to  the  people 
in  general,  somewhat  like  Stemhold  and  Hopkins,  or  Hop- 
kins and  Stemhold  /  you  may  put  which  you  please  first : 
and  as  I  confess  that  I  do  not  understand  the  merits  of 
this  case,  I  will  not  contend  it  with  Mr.  Burke. 

But  with  respect  to  the  latter,  I  have  something  to  say. 
Mr.  Burke  has  not  put  the  case  right.  The  comparison  is 
out  of  order  by  being  put  between  the  bishop  and  the  earl,  or 
the  'squire.  It  ought  to  be  put  between  the  bishop  and  the 
curate,  and  then  it  will  stand  thus :  the  people  of  England 
can  see  without  grudging  or  pain,  a  bishop  of  Durham  or  a, 
bishop  of  Winchester,  in  possession  of  ten  thousand  pounds 
a-year,  and  a  curate  on  thirty  or  forty  pounds  a-year,  or  less. 
No,  sir,  they  certainly  do  not  see  these  things  without  great 
pain  and  grudging.  It  is  a  case  that  applies  itself  to  every 
man's  sense  of  justice,  and  is  one  among  many  that  calls 
aloud  for  a  constitution. 

In  France,  the  cry  of  "  the  church !  the  church  /"  was 
repeated  as  often  as  in  Mr.  Burke's  book,  and  as  loudly  as 
when  the  dissenters'  bill  was  before  parliament ;  but  the 
generality  of  the  French  clergy  were  not  to  be  deceived  by 
this  cry  any  longer.  They  knew  that  whatever  the  pretence 
might  be,  it  was  themselves  who  were  one  of  the  principal 
objects  of  it.  It  was  the  cry  of  the  high  beneficed  clergy,  to 
prevent  any  regulation  of  income  taking  place  between  those 
of  ten  thousand  pounds  a-year  and  the  parish  priest.  They, 
therefore,  joined  their  case  to  those  of  every  other  oppressed 
class  of  men,  and  by  this  union  obtained  redress. 

The  French  constitution  has  abolished  tithes,  that  source 
of  perpetual  discontent  between  the  tithe-holder  and  the 
parishioner.  When  land  is  held  on  tithe,  it  is  in  the  condi- 
tion of  an  estate  held  between  two  parties ;  one  receiving 
one  tenth,  and  the  other  nine  tenths  of  the  produce  ;  ana, 
consequently,  on  principles  of  equity,  if  the  estate  can  be 
improved,  and  made  to  produce  by  that  improvement  double 
or  treble  what  it  did  before,  or  in  any  other  ratio,  the  expense 
of  such  improvement  ought  to  be  borne  in  like  proportion 
between  the  parties  who  are  to  share  the  produce.  But  thie 
is  not  the  case  in  tithes ;  the  farmer  bears  the  whole  expense, 
and  the  tithe-holder  takes  a  tenth  of  the  improvement,  in 
addition  to  the  original  tenth,  and  by  this  means  crets  the 


4:8  EIGHTS   OF  MAN. 

value  of  two  tenths  instead  of  one.  This  is  another  case 
that  calls  for  a  constitution. 

The  French  constitution  hath  abolished  or  renounced 
toleration,  and  i/ntoleratwn  also,  and  hath  established  wni^ 
versal  right  of  conscience. 

Toleration  is  not  the  opposite  of  intoleration,  but  is  the 
counterfeit  of  it.  Both  are  despotisms.  The  one  assumes 
to  itself  the  right  of  withholding  liberty  of  conscience,  and 
the  other  of  granting  it.  The  one  is  the  pope,  armed  with 
fire  and  fagot,  and  the  other  is  the  pope  selling  or  granting 
indulgences.  The  former  is  church  and  state,  and  the  latter 
is  church  and  traffic. 

But  toleration  may  be  viewed  in  a  much  stronger  light. 
Man  worships  not  himself,  but  his  maker :  and  the  liberty 
of  conscience  which  he  claims,  is  not  for  the  service  of  him- 
self, but  of  his  God.  In  this  case,  therefore,  we  must  neces- 
sarily have  the  associated  idea  of  two  beings ;  the  mortal 
who  renders  the  worship,  and  the  immortal  being  who  is 
worshipped.  Toleration,  therefore,  places  itself  not  between 
man  and  man,  nor  between  church  and  church,  nor  between 
one  denomination  of  religion  and  another,  but  between  God 
and  man :  between  the  being  who  worships,  and  the  being 
who  is  worshipped  ;  and  by  the  same  act  of  assumed  autho- 
rity by  which  it  tolerates  man  to  pay  his  worship,  it  pre- 
sumptuously and  blasphemously  sets  up  itself  to  tolerate 
the  Almighty  to  receive  it. 

"Were  a  bill  brought  into  parliament,  entitled,  "  An  act  to 
tolerate  or  grant  liberty  to  the  Almighty  to  receive  the 
worship  of  a  Jew  or  a  T^urk,"  or  "  to  prohibit  the  Almighty 
from  receiving  it,"  all  men  would  startle,  and  call  it  blas- 
phemy. There  would  be  an  uproar.  The  presumption  of 
toleration  in  religious  matters  would  then,  present  itself 
unasked ;  but  the  presumption  is  not  the  less  because  the 
name  of  "  man  "  only  appears  to  those  laws,  for  the  associ- 
ated idea  of  the  worshipper  and  the  worshipped  cannot  be 
separated.  "Who,  then,  art  thou,  vain  dust  and  ashes !  by 
-whatever  name  thou  art  called,  whether  a  king,  a  bishop,  a 
church  or  a  state,  a  .parliament  or  any  thing  else,  that 
obtrudest  thine  insignificance  between  the  soul  of  man  and 
his  Jiaker  ?  Mind  thine  own  concerns.  If  he  believest  not 
as  chou  believest,  it  is  a  proof  that  thou  believest  not  as  he 
believeth,  and  there  is  no  earthly  power  can  determine 
between  you. 

"With  respect  to  what  are  called  denominations  of  religion. 


RIGHTS   OF   MAH.  49 

if  every  one  is  left  to  judgre  of  his  own  religion,  there  is  no 
inch  thing  as  a  religion  tnat  is  wrong ;  but  if  they  are  to 
judge  of  each  other  s  religion,  there  is  no  such  thing  as  a 
religion  that  is  right ;  and  therefore  all  the  world  is  right, 
or  all  the  world  is  wrong.  But  with  respect  to  religion 
itself,  without  regard  to  names,  and  as  directing  itself  from 
the  universal  family  of  mankind  to  the  divine  object  of  all 
adoration,  it  is  man  bringing  to  his  maker  the  fruits  of 
his  heart;  and  though  these  fruits  may  differ  from  each 
other  like  the  fruits  of  the  earth,  the  grateful  tribute  of 
every  one  is  accepted. 

A  bishop  of  Durham,  or  a  bishop  of  Winchester,  or  the 
archbishop  who  heads  the  dukes,  will  not  refuse  a  tithe-sheaf 
of  wheat,  because  it  is  not  a  cock  of  hay ;  nor  a  cock  of 
hay,  because  it  is  not  a  sheaf  of  wheat ;  nor  a  pig  because 
't  is  neither  the  one  nor  the  other :  but  these  same  persons, 
under  the  figure  of  an  established  church,  will  not  permit 
their  maker  to  receive  the  varied  tithes  of  man's  devotion. 

One  of  the  continual  choruses  of  Mr.  Burke's  book,  is 
•'  church  and  state ;"  he  does  not  mean  some  one  particular 
church,  or  some  one  particular  state,  but  any  church  and 
state ;  and  he  uses  the  term  as  a  general  figure  to  hold  forth 
the  political  doctrine  of  always  uniting  the  church  with  the 
state  in  every  country,  and  he  censures  the  national  assem- 
bly for  not  having  done  this  in  France.  Let  us  bestow  a  fe\* 
thoughts  on  this  subject. 

Alt  religions  are,  in  their  nature,  mild  and  benign,  and 
united  wim  principles  of  morality.  They  could  not  have 
made  proselytes  at  first,  by  professing  any  thing  that  was 
vicious,  cruel,  persecuting  or  immoral.  Like  every  thing 
else,  they  had  their  beginning ;  and  they  proceeded  by  per- 
suasion, exhortation,  and  example.  How  then  is  it  that 
they  lose  their  native  mildness,  and  become  morose  and 
intolerant  ? 

It  proceeds  from  the  connexion  which  Mr.  Burke  recom- 
mends. By  engendering  the  church  with  the  state,  a  sort 
of  mule  animal,  capable  only  of  destroying,  and  not  of 
breeding  up,  is  produced,  called,  the  church  established  Jj 
law.  It  is  a  stranger,  even  from  its  birth,  to  any  parent 
mother  on  which  it  is  begotten,  and  whom  in  time  it  kicka 
out  and  destroys. 

The  inquisition  in  Spain  does  not  proceed  from  the  reli- 
gion originally  professed,  but  from  this  mule  animal,  engen- 
dered between  th*  church  and  the  state.  The  burnings  i» 


00  EIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

Smithfield  proceeded  from  the  same  heterogeneous  produc- 
tion ;  and  it  was  the  regeneration  of  this  strange  animal  iii 
England  afterwards,  that  renewed  rancor  and  irreligion 
among  the  inhabitants,  and  that  drove  the  people  called 
Quakers  and  Dissenters  to  America.  Persecution  is  not  an 
original  feature  in  any  religion ;  but  it  is  always  the  strongly 
marked  feature  of  all  law-religions,  or  religions  established 
by  law.  Take  away  the  law-establishment,  and  every  reli- 
gion re-assumes  its  original  benignity.  In  America,  a  catho- 
lic priest  is  a  good  citizen,  a  good  character,  and  a  good 
neighbor ;  an  episcopalian  minister  is  of  the  same  descrip- 
tion :  and  this  proceeds  independent  of  men,  from  there 
being  no  law-establishment  in  America. 

If  also  we  view  this  matter  in  a  temporal  sense,  we  shall 
see  the  ill  effects  it  has  had  on  the  prosperity  of  nations. 
The  union  of  church  and  state  has  impoverished  Spain. — 
The  revoking  the  edict  of  Nantz  drove  the  silk  manufacture 
from  that  country  into  England ;  and  church  and  state  are 
now  driving  the  cotton  manufacture  from  England  to  A  me- 
rica  and  France.  Let  then  Mr.  Burke  continue  to  preach 
his  anti-political  doctrine  of  church  and  state.  It  will  do 
some  good.  The  national  assembly  will  not  follow  his  ad- 
vice, but  will  benefit  by  his  folly.  It  was  by  observing  the 
ill  eifects  of  it  in  England,  that  America  has  been  warned 
against  it ;  and  it  is  by  experiencing  them  in  France,  that 
the  national  assembly  have  abolished  it,  and,  like  America, 
has  established  universal  right  of  conscience,  and  universal 
right  of  citizenship* 

*  When  in  any  country  we  see  extraordinary  circumstances  taking  place, 
they  naturally  lead  any  man  who  has  a  talent  for  observation  and  investigation, 
to  inquire  into  the  causes.  The  manufacturers  of  Manchester,  Birmingham, 
and  Sheffield,  are  the  principal  manufacturers  in  England.  From  whence  did 
this  arise  ?  A  little  observation  will  explain  the  case.  The  principal,  and  the 
generality  of  the  inhabitants  of  those  places,  are  not  of  what  is  called  in  Eng- 
land, the  church  established  by  law  :  and  they,  or  their  fathers  (for  it  is  within 
but  a  few  years)  withdrew  from  the  persecution  of  the  chartered  towns,  where 
test-laws  more  particularly  operate,  and  established  a  sort  of  asylum  for  them- 
selves in  those  places.  It  was  the  only  asylum  then  offered,  for  the  rest  of 
Europe  was  worse.  But  the  case  is  now  changing.— France  and  America  bid 
all  comers  welcome,  and  initiate  them  into  all  the  rights  of  citizenship.  Policy 
and  interest,  therefore,  will,  but  perhaps  too  late,  dictate  in  England  what  rea- 
son and  justice  could  not.  Those  manufacturers  are  withdrawing  to  other 
places.  There  is  now  erecting  in  Passey,  three  miles  from  Paris,  a  large  cotton 
manufactory,  and  several  are  already  erected  in  America.  Soon  after  the  reject- 
ing the  bill  for  repealing  the  test-law,  one  of  the  richest  manufacturers  in  Eng- 
land said  in  my  hearing,  "England,  sir,  is  not  a  country  for  a  Dissenter  to  live 
in. — we  must  gro  to  France."  These  are  truths,  ami  it.  i-»  doing  justice  to  both 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN.  51 

I  will  here  cease  the  comparison  with  respect  to  the  prin- 
ciples of  the  French  constitution,  and  conclude  this  part  of 
the  subject  with  a  few  observations  on  the  organization  of  the 
formal  parts  of  the  French  and  English  governments. 

The  executive  power  in  each  country  is  in  the  hands  of  a 
person  styled  the  King  ;  but  the  French  constitution  distin- 
guishes between  the  king  and  the  sovereign :  it  considers 
Sie  station  of  king  as  official,  and  places  sovereignty  in  the 
nation. 

The  representatives  of  the  nation,  which  compose  the  na- 
tional assembly,  and  who  are  the  legislative  power,  originate 
in  and  from  the  people  by  election,  as  an  innerent  right  in 
the  people.  In  England  it  is  otherwise;  and  this  arises 
from  the  original  establishment  of  what  is  called  its  monar- 
chy ;  for  as  by  the  conquest  all  the  rights  of  the  people  or 
the  nation  were  absorbed  into  the  hands  of  the  conqueror, 
and  who  added  the  title  of  king  to  that  of  conqueror,  those 
same  matters  which  in  France  are  now  held  as  rights  in  the 
oeople,  or  in  the  nation,  are  held  in  England  as  grants  from 
what  is  called  the  crown.  The  parliament  in  England,  in 
both  its  branches,  was  erected  by  patents  from  the  descend- 
ants of  the  conqueror.  The  house  of  commons  did  not  origi- 
nate as  a  matter  of  right  in  the  people,  to  delegate  or  elect, 
but  as  a  grant  or  boon. 

By  the  French  constitution,  the  nation  is  always  named 
before  the  king.  The  third  article  of  the  declaration  of 
rights  says,  "The  nation  is  essentially  the  source  (or  foun- 
tain) of  all  sovereignty"  Mr.  Burke  argues,  that,  in  Eng- 
land, a  king  is  the  fountain — that  he  is  the  fountain  of  all 
honor.  But  as  this  idea  is  evidently  descended  from  the  con- 
quest, I  shall  make  no  other  remark  upon  it  than  that  it  is 
the  nature  of  conquest  to  turn  every  thing  upside  down ; 
and  as  Mr.  Burke  will  not  be  refused  the  privilege  of  speak- 
in  twice,  and  as  there  are  but  two  parts  in  the  figure,  the 

parties  to  tell  them.  It  is  chiefly  the  Dissenters  that  have  carried  English 
manufactures  to  the  height  they  are  now  at,  and  the  same  men  have  it  in  theii 
power  to  carry  them  away  ;  and  though  those  manufacturers  would  afterwards 
continue  in  those  places,  the  foreign  market  will  be  lost.  There  frequently  ap- 
pears in  the  London  Gazette,  extracts  from  certain  acts  to  prevent  machines, 
and  as  far  as  it  can  extend  to  persons,  from  going  out  of  the  country.  It  ap- 
pears from  these  that  the  ill  effects  of  the  test-laws  and  church-establishment 
begin  to  be  much  suspected ;  but  the  remedy  of  force  can  never  supply  the 
remedy  of  reason.  In  the  progress  of  less  than  a  century,  all  the  unrepresented 
part  of  England,  of  all  denominations  which  is  at  least  an  hundred  times  the 
most  numerous,  may  begin  to  feel  the  necessity  of  a  constitution,  and  then  aU 
matters  will  come  regularly  before  them. 


DZ  BIGHTS   OF  MAN. 

fountain  and  the  spout,  he  will  be  right  the  second 
time. 

The  French  constitution  puts  the  legislative  before  the 
executive ;  the  law  before  the  king ;  la  loi,  le  roi.  This  also 
is  in  the  natural  order  of  things ;  because  laws  must  have 
existence,  before  they  can  have  execution. 

A  king  in  France  does  not,  in  addressing  himself  to  the 
national  assembly,  say,  "  my  assembly,"  similar  to  the  phrase 
used  in  England  of  "  my  parliament ;"  neither  can  he  use  it 
consistent  with  the  constitution,  nor  could  it  be  admitted.. 
There  may  be  propriety  in  the  use  of  it  in  England,  because, 
as  is  before  mentioned,  both  houses  of  parliament  originated 
out  of  what  is  called  the  crown,  by  patent  or  boon — and  not 
out  of  the  inherent  rights  of  the  people,  as  the  national 
assembly  does  in  France,  and  whose  name  designates  its 
origin. 

The  president  of  the  national  assembly  does  not  ask  the 
king  to  grant  to  the  assembly  the  liberty  of  speech,  as  is  the 
case  with  the  English  house  of  commons.  The  constitutional 
dignity  of  the  national  assembly  cannot  debase  itself.  Speech 
is>  in  the  first  place,  one  of  the  natural  rights  of  man,  always 
retained ;  and  with  respect  to  the  national  assembly,  the  use 
of  it  is  their  duty,  and  the  nation  is  their  authority.  They 
were  elected  by  the  greatest  body  of  men  exercising  the 
right  of  election  the  European  world  ever  saw.  They 
sprung  not  from  the  filth  of  rotten  boroughs,  nor  are  they 
vassal  representatives  of  aristocratical  ones.  Feeling  the 
proper  dignity  of  their  character,  they  support  it.  Their 
parliamentary  language,  whether  for  or  against  a  question, 
is  free,  bold,  and  manly,  and  extends  to  all  the  parts  and 
circumstances  of  the  case.  If  any  matter  or  subject  respect- 
ing the  executive  department,  or  the  person  who  presides  in 
it  (the  king,)  comes  before  them,  it  is  debated  on  with  the 
spirit  of  men,  and  the  language  of  gentlemen;  and  their 
answer,  or  their  address,  is  returned  in  the  same  style. 
They  stand  not  aloft  with  the  gaping  vacuity  of  vulgar 
ignorance,  nor  bend  with  the  cringe  of  sycophantic  insignifi- 
cance. The  graceful  pride  of  truth  knows  no  extremes,  and 
preserves  in  every  latitude  of  life  the  right-angled  character 
of  man. 

Let  us  now  look  to  the  other  side  of  the  question.  In  the 
addresses  of  the  English  parliaments  to  their  kings,  we  see 
neither  the  intrepid  spirit  of  the  old  parliaments  of  France, 
nor  the  serene  dignity  of  the  present  national  assembly; 


RIGHTS    OF    MAN.  53 

neither  do  we  see  in  them  any  thing  of  the  style  of  English 
manners,  which  borders  somewhat  on  bluntness.  Since  then 
they  are  neither  of  foreign  extraction,  nor  naturally  of  Eng- 
lish production,  their  origin  must  be  sought  for  elsewhere, 
and  that  origin  is  the  Norman  conquest.  They  are  evidently 
of  the  vassalage  class  of  manners,  and  emphatically  mart 
the  prostrate  distance  that  exists  in  no  other  condition  of 
men  than  between  the  conqueror  and  the  conquered.  That 
this  vassalage  idea  and  style  of  speaking  was  not  got  rid  of, 
even  at  the  revolution  of  1688,  is  evident  from  the  declara- 
tion of  parliament  to  William  and  Mary,  in  these  words : 
"  we  do  most  humbly  and  faithfully  submit  ourselves,  our 
heirs  and  posterity  for  ever."  Submission  is  wholly  a  vas- 
salage term,  repugnant  to  the  dignity  of  freedom,  and  an 
echo  of  the  language  used  at  the  conquest. 

As  the  estimation  of  all  things  is  by  comparison,  the  revo- 
jution  of  1688,  however  from  circumstances  it  may  have 
oeen  exalted  above  its  value,  will  find  its  level.  It  is  already 
on  the  wane,  eclipsed  by  the  enlarging  orb  of  reason,  and 
the  revolutions  of  America  and  France.  In  less  than  another 
century,  it  will  go,  as  well  as  Mr.  Burke's  labors,  "  to  the 
family  vault  of  all  the  Capulets."  Mankind  will  then 
scarcely  believe  that  a  country  calling  itself  free,  would  send 
to  Holland  for  a  man,  and  clothe  him  with  power,  on  pur 
pose  to  put  themselves  in  fear  of  him,  and  give  him  almost 
a  million  sterling  a-year  for  leave  to  submit  themselves  and 
their  posterity,  like  "bondmen  and  bondwomen  for  ever. 

But  there  is  a  truth  that  ought  to  be  made  known  ;  I 
have  had  the  opportunity  of  seeing  it :  which  is,  that  not- 
withstanding appearances,  there  is  not  any  description  of 
men  that  despise  monarchy  so  much  as  courtiers.  But  they 
well  know,  that  if  it  were  seen  by  others,  as  it  is  seen  by 
them,  the  juggle  could  not  be  kept  up.  They  are  in  the 
condition  of  men  who  get  their  living  by  show,  and  to  whom 
the  folly  of  that  show  is  so  familiar  that  they  ridicule  it ; 
but  were  the  audience  to  be  made  9-s  wise,  in  this  respect, 
as  themselves,  there  would  be  an  end  to  the  show  and  the 
profits  with  it.  The  difference  between  a  republican  and  a 
courtier  with  respect  to  monarchy,  is,  that  the  one  opposes 
monarchy  believing  it  to  be  something,  and  the  other  laughs 
at  it  knowing  it  to  be  nothing. 

As  I  used  sometimes  to  correspond  with  Mr.  Burke,  be- 
lieving him  then  to  be  a  man  of  sounder  principle*  than  his 
hook  snows  him  to  be.  1  wrote  to  him  last  winter  from  Paris, 


KIGHTS   OF   MAJT. 


and  gave  him  an  account  how  prosperously  matters  were 
going  on.  Among  other  subjects  in  that  letter,  I  referred 
to  the  happy  situation  the  national  assembly  were  placed 
in ;  that  they  had  taken  a  ground  on  which  their  moral 
duty  and  their  political  interest  were  united.  They  have 
not  to  hold  out  a  language  which  they  do  not  believe,  for 
the  fraudulent  purpose  of  making  others  believe  it.  Their 
station  requires  no  artifice  to  support  it,  and  can  only  be 
maintained  by  enlightening  mankind.  It  is  not  their  in- 
terest to  cherish  ignorance,  but  to  dispel  it.  They  are  not 
in  the  case  of  a  ministerial  or  an  opposition  party  in  Eng- 
land, who,  though  they  are  opposed,  are  still  united  to  keep 
up  the  common  mystery.  The  national  assembly  must 
throw  open  a  magazine  of  light.  It  must  show  man  the 
proper  character  of  man  ;  and  the  nearer  it  can  bring  him 
to  that  standard,  the  stronger  the  national  assembly  be- 
comes. 

In  contemplating  the  French  constitution,  we  see  in  it 
a  rational  order  of  things.  The  principles  harmonize  with 
the  forms,  and  both  with  their  origin.  It  may  perhaps  be 
said  as  an  excuse  for  bad  forms,  tliat  they  are  nothing  more 
than  forms  ;  but  this  is  a  mistake.  Forms  grow  out  of 
principles,  and  operate  to  continue  the  principles  they  grow 
from.  It  is  impossible  to  practise  a  bad  form  on  any  tiling 
but  a  bad  principle.  It  cannot  be  engrafted  on  a  good  one ; 
and  wherever  the  forms  in  any  government  are  bad,  it  is  a 
certain  indication  that  the  principles  are  bad  also. 

I  will  here  finally  close  this  subject.  I  began  it  by  re- 
marking that  Mr.  Burke  had  .voluntarily  declined  going 
into  a  comparison  of  the  English  and  French  constitutions. 
He  apologized  (p.  241)  for  not  doing  it,  by  saying  that  he 
had  not  time.  Mr.  Burke's  book  was  upwards  of  eight 
months  in  hand,  and  it  extended  to  a  volume  of  three  hun- 
dred and  fifty-six  pages.  As  his  omission  does  injury  to  his 
cause,  his  apology  makes  it  worse  ;  and  men  on  the  English 
side  of  the  water  will  begin  to  consider,  whether  there  is  not 
some  radical  defect  in  what  is  called  the  English  constitu- 
tion, that  made  it  necessary  in  Mr.  Burke  to  suppress  the 
comparison,  to  avoid  bringing  it  into  view. 

As  Mr.  Burke  has  not  written  on  constitutions,  so  neither 
has  he  written  on  the  French  revolution.  He  gives  no  ac- 
count of  its  commencement  or  its  progress.  He  only  ex- 
presses his  wonder.  "  It  looks,"  says  he,  "  to  me  as  if  I 
were  in  a  great  crisis,  not  of  the  affairs  of  France  alone,  but 


RIGHTS   OF  MAN.  55 

of  all  Europe,  perhaps  of  more  than  Europe.  All  circum- 
stances taken  together,  the  French  revolution  is  the  most 
astonishing  that  has  hitherto  happened  in  the  world." 

As  wise  men  are  astonished  at  foolish  things,  and  other 
people  at  wise  ones,  I  know  not  on  which  ground  to  account 
tor  Mr.  Burke's  astonishment ;  but  certain  it  is  that  he  does 
not  understand  the  French  revolution.  It  has  apparently 
burst  forth  like  a  creation  from  a  chaos,  but  it  is  no  more 
than  the  consequences  of  mental  revolution  previously  exist- 
ing in  France.  The  mind  of  the  nation  had  changed  before- 
hand, and  a  new  order  of  things  has  naturally  followed  a 
new  order  of  thoughts. — I  will  here,  as  concisely  as  I 
can,  trace  out  the  growth  of  the  French  revolution,  and 
mark  the  circumstances  that  have  contributed  to  produce 
it. 

The  despotism  of  Louis  the  XIV.  united  with  the  gaiety 
of  his  court,  and  the  gaudy  ostentation  of  his  character,  had 
so  humbled,  and  at  the  same  time  so  fascinated  the  mind  of 
France,  that  the  people  appear  to  have  lost  all  sense  of  their 
own  dignity,  in  contemplating  that  of  their  grand  monarch ; 
and  the  whole  reign  of  Louis  XY.  remarkable  only  for 
weakness  and  effeminacy,  made  no  other  alteration  than 
that  of  spreading  a  sort  of  lethargy  over  the  nation,  from 
which  it  snowed  no  disposition  to  rise. 

The  only  signs  which  appeared  of  the  spirit  of  liberty 
during  those  periods,  are  to  be  found  in  the  writings  of  the 
French  philosophers.  Montesquieu,  president  of  the  parlia- 
ment of  ^Bordeaux,  went  as  far  as  a  writer  under  a  despotic 
government  could  well  proceed :  and  being  obliged  to  divide 
himself  between  principle  and  prudence,  his  mind  often  ap- 
pears under  a  veil,  and  we  ought  to  give  him  credit  for 
more  than  he  has  expressed. 

Voltaire,  who  was  both  the  flatterer  and  satirist  of  des- 
potism, took  another  line.  His  forte  lay  in  exposing  and 
ridiculing  the  superstitions  which  priest-craft,  united  with 
state-craft,  had  interwoven  with  governments.  It  was  not 
from  the  purity  of  his  principles,  or  his  love  of  mankind,  (for 
satire  and  philanthropy  are  not  naturallv  concordant,)  but 
from  his  strong  capacity  of  seeing  fol  y  in  its  true  shape,  and 
his  irresistible  propensity  to  expose  it,  that  he  made  those 
attacks.  They  were  however  as  form  idable  as  if  the  motives 
had  been  virtuous ;  and  he  merits  the  thanks  rather  than 
the  esteem  of  mankind. 

On  the  contrary,  wo  find  in  the  writings  of  Rousseau  and 


56  RIGHTS    OF 

abbe  Raynal,  a  loveliness  of  sentiment  in  favor  of  liberty, 
that  excites  respect,  and  elevates  the  human  faculties  ;  yet 
having  raised  this  animation,  they  do  not  direct  its  opera- 
tions, but  leave  the  mind  in  love  with  an  object,  without 
describing  the  means  of  possessing  it. 

The  writings  of  Quisne,  Turgot,  and  the  friends  of  those 
authors,  are  of  a  serious  kind ;  but  thev  labored  under  the 
same  disadvantage  with  Montesquieu ;  tneir  writings  abound 
with  moral  maxims  of  government,  but  are  rather  directed 
to  economise  and  reform  the  administration  of  the  govern- 
ment, than  the  government  itself. 

But  all  those  writings  and  many  others  had  their  weight ; 
and  by  the  different  manner  in  which  they  treated  the  sub- 
ject of  government,  Montesquieu  by  his  judgment  and 
knowledge  of  laws:  Yoltaire  by  his  wit;  Rousseau  and 
Raynal  by  their  animation,  and  Quisne  and  Turgot  by  their 
moral  znaxims  and  systems  of  economy,  readers  of  every 
class  met  with  something  to  their  taste,  and  a  spirit  of  politi- 
cal inquiry  began  to  diffuse  itself  through  the  nation  at  the 
time  the  dispute  between  England  and  the  then  colonies  of 
America  broke  out. 

In  the  war  which  France  afterwards  engaged  in,  it  is  very 
well  known  that  the  nation  appeared  to  be  beforehand  with 
the  French  ministry.  Each  of  them  had  its  views ;  but  those 
views  were  directed  to  different  olyjects ;  the  one  sought 
liberty  and  the  other  retaliation  on  England.  The  French 
officers  and  soldiers  who  after  this  went  to  America,  were 
eventually  placed  in  the  school  of  freedom,  and  learned  the 
practice  as  well  as  the  principles  of  it  by  heart. 

As  it  was  impossible  to  separate  the  military  events  which 
took  place  in  America  from  the  principles  of  the  American 
revolution,  the  publication  of  those  events  in  France  neces- 
sarily connected  themselves  with  the  principles  that  pro- 
duced them.  Many  of  the  facts  were  in  themselves  princi- 
ples; such  as  the  declaration  of  American  Independence, 
and  the  treaty  of  alliance  between  France  and  America, 
which  recognized  the  natural  rights  of  man,  and  justified 
resistance  to  oppression. 

The  then  minister  of  France,  count  Yergennes,  was  not 
the  friend  of  America ;  and  it  is  both  justice  and  gratitude 
to  say,  that  it  was  the  queen  of  France  who  gave  the  cause 
<>f  America  a  fashion  at  the  French  court.  Count  Vergennes 
was  the  personal  and  social  friend  of  Dr.  Franklin ;  and  the 
doctor  had  obtained  by  his  sensible  gracefulness,  a  s"ft  of 


RIGHTS   OF   MAN.  5? 

mfliienee  over  him ;  but  with  respect  to  principles,  count 
Vergennes  was  a  despot. 

The  situation  of  Dr.  Franklin  as  minister  from  America 
to  France  should  be  taken  into  the  chain  of  circumstances. 
A  diplomatic  character  is  the  narrowest  sphere  of  society 
that  man  can  act  in.  It  forbids  intercourse  by  a  reciprocity 
of  suspicion;  and  a  diplomatist  is  a  sort  of  unconnected 
atom,  continually  repelling  and  repelled.  But  this  was  not 
the  case  with  Dr.  Franklin ;  he  was  not  the  diplomatist  of  a 
court,  but  of  man.  His  character  as  a  philosopher  had  been 
long  established,  and  his  circle  of  society  in  France  wai 
universal. 

Count  Vergennes  resisted  for  a  considerable  time  the  pub 
lication  of  the  American  constitutions  in  France,  translated 
into  the  French  language ;  but  even  in  this  he  was  obliged 
to  give  way  to  public  opinion,  and  a  sort  of  propriety  in 
admitting  to  appear  what  he  had  undertaken  to  defend. 
The  American  constitutions  were  to  liberty,  what  a  gram- 
mar is  to  language:  they  define  its  parts  of  speech,  and 
practically  construct  them  into  syntax. 

The  peculiar  situation  of  the  then  marquis  de  la  Fayette 
is  another  link  in  the  great  chain.  He  served  in  America 
as  an  American  officer,  under  a  commission  of  congress,  and 
by  the  universality  of  his  acquaintance,  was  in  close  friend- 
ship with  the  civil  government  of  America  as  well  as  with 
the  military  line.  He  spoke  the  language  of  the  country, 
entered  into  the  discussions  on  the  principles  of  government, 
and  was  always  a  welcome  friend  at  any  election. 

When  the  war  closed,  a  vast  reinforcement  to  the  cause  of 
liberty  spread  itself  over  France,  by  the  return  of  the  French 
officers  and  soldiers.  A  knowledge  of  the  practice  was  then 
joined  to  the  theory ;  and  all  that  was  wanting  to  give  it  real 
existence,  was  opportunity.  Man,  cannot,  properly  speak- 
ing, make  circumstances  tor  his  purpose,  but  he  always  has 
it  in  his  power  to  improve  them  when  they  occur :  and  this 
was  the  case  in  France. 

M.  Neckar  was  displaced  in  May,  1781 ;  and  by  the  ill 
management  of  the  finances  afterwards,  and  particularly 
during  the  extravagant  administration  of  M.  Oalonne,  the 
revenue  of  France  which  was  nearly  twenty-four  millionn 
sterling  per  year,  was  become  unequal  to  the  expenditures, 
not  because  the  revenue  had  decreased,  but  because  the  ex- 
penses had  increased,  and  this  was  the  circumstance  which 
the  nation  laid  hold  of  to  bring:  forward  a  revolution.  The 


58  RIGHTS   OF   MAJT. 

English  minister,  Mr.  Pitt,  has  frequently  alluded  to  the 
state  of  the  French  finances  in  his  budgets,  without  under 
standing  the  subject.  Had  the  French  parliaments  been  as 
ready  to  register  edicts  for  new  taxes,'  as  an  English  par- 
liament is  to  grant  them,  there  had  been  no  derangement  in 
the  finances,  nor  yet  any  revolution;  but  this  will  better 
explain  itself  as  I  proceed. 

It  will  be  necessary  here  to  show  how  taxes  were  formerly 
raised  in  France.  Tne  king,  or  rather  the  court  or  ministry, 
acting  under  the  use  of  that  name,  framed  the  edicts  for 
taxes  at  their  own  discretion,  and  sent  them  to  the  parlia- 
ments to  be  registered ;  for  until  they  were  registered  by  the 
parliaments,  they  were  not  operative.  Disputes  had  long 
existed  between  the  court  and  the  parliament  with  respect 
to  the  extent  of  the  parliament's  authority  on  this  head. 
The  court  insisted  that  the  authority  of  parliament  went  no 
farther  than  to  remonstrate  or  show  reasons  against  the  tax, 
reserving  to  itself  the  right  of  determining  whether  the 
reasons  were  well  or  ill-founded ;  and  in  consequence  there- 
of, either  to  withdraw  the  edict  as  a  matter  of  choice,  or  to 
order  it  to  be  registered  as  a  matter  of  authority.  The  par- 
liaments on  their  part  insisted,  that  they  had  not  only  a 
right  to  remonstrate,  but  to  reject ;  and  on  this  ground  they 
were  always  supported  by  the  nation. 

But  to  return  to  the  order  of  my  narrative — M.  Calonne 
wanted  money ;  and  as  he  knew  the  sturdy  disposition  of 
the  parliaments  with  respect  to  new  taxes,  he  ingeniously 
sought  either  to  approach  them  by  a  more  gentle  means  than 
that  of  direct  authority,  or  to  get  over  their  heads  by  a 
manoeuvre :  and,  for  this  purpose,  he  revived  the  project  of 
assembling  a  body  of  men  from  the  several  provinces,  under 
the  style  of  an  "  assembly  of  the  notables,"  or  men  of  note, 
who  met  in  1787,  and  were  either  to  recommend  taxes  tc 
the  parliaments,  or  to  act  as  a  parliament  themselves.  An 
assembly  under  this  name  had  been  called  in  1687. 

As  we  are  to  view  this  as  the  first  practical  step  towards 
the  revolution,  it  will  be  proper  to  enter  into  some  par- 
ticulars respecting  it.  The  assembly  of  the  notables  has  in 
some  places  been  mistaken  for  the  states-general,  but  was 
wholly  a  different  body ;  the  states-general  being  always  by 
election.  The  persons  who  composed  the  assembly  of  the 
notables  were  all  nominated  by  the  king,  and  consisted  of 
one  hundred  and  forty  members.  But  as  M.  Calonne  could 
not  depend  upon  a  majority  of  this  assemblv  in  his  favor,  he 


BIGHTS  OF  MAN.  59 

very  ingeniously  arranged  them  in  such  a  manner  as  to 
make  forty-four  a  majority  of  one  hundred  and  forty :  to 
effect  this  he  disposed  of  them  into  seven  separate  com- 
mittees of  twenty  members  each.  Every  general  question 
was  to  be  decided,  not  by  a  majority  of  persons,  but  by  a 
majority  of  committees ;  and,  as  eleven  votes  would  make  a 
majority  in  a  committee,  and  four  committees  a  majority  of 
aeven,  M.  Calonne  had  good  reason  to  conclude,  that  as 
forty-four  would  determine  any  general  question,  he  could 
not  be  out-voted.  But  all  his  plans  deceived  him,  and  in 
the  event  became  his  overthrow. 

The  then  marquis  de  la  Fayette  was  placed  in  the  second 
committee,  of  which  count  d  Artois  was  president ;  and  as 
money  matters  was  the  object,  it  naturally  brought  into  view 
ev^ry  circumstance  connected  with  it.  M.  de  la  Fayette 
made  a  verbal  charge  against  Calonne,  for  selling  crown 
land  to  the  amount  of  two  millions  of  livres,  in  a  manner 
that  appeared  to  be  unknown  to  the  king.  The  count  d' Ar- 
tois (as  if  to  intimidate,  for  the  Bastile  was  then  in  being) 
askea  the  marquis,  if  he  would  render  the  charge  in  writing  ? 
He  replied  that  he  would.  The  count  d' Artois  did  not  de- 
mand it,  but  brought  a  message  from  the  king  to  that  pur- 
port. M.  de  la  Fayette  then  delivered  in  his  charge  in  writ- 
ing, to  be  given  to  the  king,  undertaking  to  support  it.  No 
further  proceedings  were  had  upon  this  affair ;  but  M.  Calonne 
was  soon  after  dismissed  by  the  king,  and  went  to  England. 

As  M.  de  la  Fayette,  from  the  experience  he  had  had  in 
America,  was  better  acquainted  witn  the  science  of  civil 
government  than  the  generality  of  the  members  who  com- 
posed the  assembly  of  the  notables  could  then  be,  the  brunt 
of  the  business  fell  considerably  to  his  share.  The  plan  of 
those  who  had  a  constitution  in  view,  was  to  contend  with 
the  court  on  the  ground  of  taxes,  and  some  of  them  openly 
professed  their  object.  Disputes  frequently  arose  between 
count  d' Artois  and  M.  de  la  Fayette  upon  various  subjects. 
With  respect  to  the  arrears  already  incurred,  the  latter  pro- 
posed to  remedy  them,  by  accommodating  the  expenses  to 
the  revenue,  instead  of  the  revenue  to  the  expenses  ;  and  as 
objects  of  reform,  he  proposed  to  abolish  the  .Bastile,  and  all 
the  state  prisoners  throughout  the  nation  (the  keeping  of 
which  was  attended  with  great  expense)  and  to  suppress  let- 
ires  de  cachet  /  but  those  matters  were  not  then  much  at- 
tended to ;  and  with  respect  to  lettres  de  cacJiet,  a  majority 
of  the  nobles  appeared  to  be  in  favor  of  them. 


60  EIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

On  the  subject  of  supplying  the  treasury  by  new  taxes, 
the  assembly  ueclined  taking  the  matter  on  themselves,  con- 
curring in  the  opinion  that  they  had  not  authority.  In  a 
debate  on  the  subject,  M.  de  la  Fayette  said,  that  raising 
money  by  taxes  could  only  be  done  by  a  national  assembly, 
freely  elected  by  the  people  and  acting  as  their  representa- 
tives. Do  you  mean,  said  the  count  d'Artois,  the  states- 
general  ?  M.  de  la  Fayette  replied,  that  he  did.  Will  you, 
said  the  count  d'Artois,  sign  -what  you  say,  to  be  given  to 
the  king  ?  The  other  replied,  that  he  not  only  would  do 
this,  but  that  he  would  go  further,  and  say,  that  the  effec- 
tual mode  would  be,  for  the  king  to  agree  to  the  establish- 
ment of  a  constitution. 

As  one  of  the  plans  had  thus  failed,  that  of  getting  the 
assembly  to  act  as  a  parliament,  the  other  came  into  view, 
that  of  recommending.  On  this  subject,  the  assembly 
agreed  to  recommend  two  new  taxes  to  be  enregistered  by 
the  parliament,  the  one  a  stamp-act,  and  the  other  a  terri- 
torial tax,  or  sort  of  land  tax.  The  two  have  been' estimated 
at  about  five  millions  sterling  per  annum.  "We  have  now 
to  turn  our  attention  to  the  parliaments,  on  whom  the  busi 
ness  was  again  devolving. 

The  archbishop  of  Toulouse  (since  archbishop  of  Sens, 
and  now  a  cardinal)  was  appointed  to  the  administration  of 
the  finances,  soon  after  the  dismission  of  Calonne.  He  was 
also  made  prime  minister,  an  office  that  did  not  always 
exist  in  France.  When  this  office  did  not  exist,  the  chief  of 
each  of  the  principal  departments  transacted  business  imme- 
diately with  the  king ;  but  when  the  prime  minister  was 
appointed,  they  did  business  only  with  him.  The  arch- 
bishop arrived  to  more  state-authority  than  any  minister 
since  the  duke  de  Choiseuil,  and  the  nation  was  strongly 
disposed  in  his  favor ;  but  by  a  line  of  conduct  scarcely  to 
be  accounted  for,  he  perverted  every  opportunity,  turned 
out  a  despot,  and  sunk  into  disgrace,  and  a  cardinal. 

The  assembly  of  the  notables  having  broke  up,  the  new 
minister  sent  the  edicts  for  the  two  new  taxes  recommended 
by  the  assembly  to  the  parliament,  to  be  enregistered. 
They  of  course  came  first  before  the  parliament  of  Paris, 
who  returned  for  answer ;  That  with  suoh  a  revenue  as  th& 
nation  then  supported,  the  name  of  taxes  ought  not  to  be  men- 
tioned, but  for  the  purpose  of  reducing  them'  and  threw 
both  the  edicts  out.* 

*  When  the  English  minister,  Mr.  Pitt,  mentions  the  French  finances  again 


RIGHTS   OF   MAN.  61 

On  this  refusal,  the  parliament  was  ordered  to  Versailles, 
where  in  the  usual  form,  the  king  held,  what  under  the  old 
government  was  called  a  bed  of  justice  :  and  the  two  edicts 
were  enregistered  in  presence  of  the  parliament,  by  an  order 
of  state,  in  the  manner  mentioned,  p.  58.  On  this,  the  par- 
liament immediately  returned  to  Paris,  renewed  their  session 
in  form,  and  ordered  the  registering  to  be  struck  out,  declar- 
ing that  every  thing  done  at  Versailles  was  illegal.  All  the 
members  of  parliament  were  then  served  with  lettres  de 
zacliet)  and  exiled  to  Trois ;  but  as  they  continued  as  inflex- 
ible in  exile  as  before,  and  as  vengeance  did  not  supply  the 
place  of  taxes,  they  were  after  a  short  time  recalled  to  Paris. 

The  edicts  were  again  tendered  to  them,  and  the  count 
d'Artois  undertook  to  act  as  representative  for  the  king. — • 
For  this  purpose,  he  came  from  Versailles  to  Paris,  in  a  train 
of  procession ;  and  the  parliament  was  assembled  to  receive 
him.  But  show  and  parade  had  lost  their  influence  in 
France ;  and  whatever  ideas  of  importance  he  might  set  off 
with,  he  had  to  return  with  those  of  mortification  and  dis- 
appointment. On  alighting  from  his  carriage  to  ascend  the 
steps  of  the  parliament  house,  the  crowd  (which  was  numer- 
ously collected)  threw  out  trite  expressions,  saying,  "  This  is 
monsieur  d'Artois,  who  wants  more  of  our  money  to  spend." 
The  marked  disapprobation  which  he  saw,  impressed  him 
with  apprehensions  ;  and  the  word  aux  armes^  (to  arms,}  was 
given  out  by  the  officer  of  the  guard  who  attended  him.  It 
was  so  loudly  vociferated,  that  it  echoed  through  the 
avenues  of  the  house,  and  produced  a  temporary  confusion : 
I  was  then  standing  in  one  of  the  apartments  through  which 
he  had  to  pass,  and  could  not  avoid  reflecting  how  wretched 
is  the  condition  of  a  disrespected  man. 

He  endeavoured  to  impress  the  parliament  by  great  words, 
and  opened  his  authority  by  saying,  "  The  king,  our  lord  and 
master."  The  parliament  received  him  very  coolly,  and 
with  their  usual  determination  not  to  register  the  taxes ;  and 
in  this  manner  the  interview  ended. 

After  this  a  new  subject  took  place  :  in  the  various  debates 
and  contests  that  arose  between  the  court  and  the  parlia- 
ments on  the  subject  of  taxes,  the  parliament  of  Paris  at  last 
declared,  that  although  it  had  been  customary  for  parlia- 
ments to  enregister  edicts  for  taxes  as  a  matter  of  conveni- 
ence, the  right  belonged  only  to  the  states-general :  and  that, 

in  the  Eng'ish  parliament,  it  would  be  well  that  he  noticed  this  as  an  ex- 
ample. 


62  BIGHTS   OF   MAIS'. 

therefore,  the  parliaments  COIL. I  no  longer  with  propriety 
continue  to  debate  on  what  it  had  not  authority  to  act.  The 
king,  after  this,  came  to  Paris,  and  held  a  meeting  with  the 
parliament,  in  which  he  continued  from  ten  in  the  morning 
till  about  six  in  the  evening  ;  and,  in  a  manner  that  appear- 
ed to  proceed  from  him,  as  if  unconsulted  upon  with  the 
cabinet  or  the  ministry,  gave  his  word  to  the  parliament, 
that  the  states-general  should  be  convened. 

But,  after  this,  another  scene  arose,  on  a  ground  different 
from  all  the  former.  The  minister  and  the  cabinet  were 
averse  to  calling  the  states-general :  they  well  knew,  that 
if  the  states-general  were  assembled,  that  themselves  must 
fall ;  and  as  the  king  had  not  mentioned  any  time,  they 
hit  on  a  project  calculated  to  elude,  without  appearing  to 
oppose. 

For  this  purpose,  the  court  set  about  making  a  sort  of 
constitution  itself:  it  was  principally  the  work  of  M. 
Lamoigiion,  keeper  of  the  seals,  who  afterwards  shot  him- 
self. The  arrangement  consisted  in  establishing  a  body 
under  the  name  of  a  cour  pleniere,  or  full  court,  in  which 
were  invested  all  the  power  that  the  government  might  have 
occasion  to  make  use  of.  The  persons  composing  this  court 
to  be  nominated  by  the  king  ;  the  contended  right  of  taxa- 
tion was  given  up  on  the  part  of  the  king,  and  a  new  crimi- 
nal code  of  laws,  and  law  proceedings,  was  substituted  in 
the  room  of  the  former.  The  thing,  in  many  points,  con- 
tained better  principles  than  those  upon  which  the  govern- 
ment had  hitherto  been  administered  :  but,  with  respect  to 
the  cour  pleniere,  it  was  no  other  than  a  medium  through 
which  despotism  was  to  pass,  without  appearing  to  act 
directly  from  itself. 

The  cabinet  had  high  expectations  from  their  new  contri- 
vance. The  persons  who  were  to  compose  the  cour  pleniere^ 
were  already  nominated ;  and  as  it  was  necessary  to  carry  a 
fair  appearance,  many  of  the  best  characters  in  the  nation 
were  appointed  among  the  number.  It  was  to  commence 
on  the  8th  of  May,  1788 :  but  an  opposition  arose  to  it,  on 
two  grounds — the  one  as  to  principle,  the  other  as  to 
form. 

On  the  ground  of  principle  it  was  contended,  that  govern- 
ment had  not  a  right  to  alter  itself ;  and  that  if  the  practice 
was  once  admitted  it  would  grow  into  a  principle,  and  be 
made  a  precedent  for  any  future  alterations  the  government 
might  wish  to  establish ;  that  the  right  of  altering  the  gov- 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN.  99 

eminent  was  a  national  right,  and  not  a  right  of  government. 
A.nd  on  the  ground  of  form,  it  was  contended  that  the  cour 
pleniere  was  nothing  more  than  a  large  cabinet. 

The  then  dukes  de  la  Rochefoucault,  Luxembourg,  de 
Koailles,  and  many  others,  refused  to  accept  the  nomination, 
and  strenuously  opposed  the  whole  plan.  When  the  edict 
for  establishing  tnis  new  court  was  sent  to  the  parliaments 
to  be  enregistered,  and  put  into  execution,  they  resisted  also. 
The  parliament  of  Paris  not  only  refused,  but  denied  the 
authority  ;  and  the  contest  renewed  itself  between  the  parli- 
ament and  the  cabinet  more  strongly  than  ever.  While  the 
parliament  was  sitting  in  debate  on  tnis  subject,  the  ministry 
ordered  a  regiment  of  soldiers  to  surround  the  house,  and 
form  a  blockade.  The  members  sent  out  for  beds  and  pro- 
vision, and  lived  as  in  a  besieged  citadel ;  and  as  this  had  no 
effect,  the  commanding  officer  was  ordered  to  enter  the 
parliament  house  and  seize  them,  which  he  did,  and  some 
of  the  principal  members  were  shut  up  in  different  prisons. 
About  the  same  time  a  deputation  of  persons  arrived  from 
the  province  of  Britanny,  to  remonstrate  against  the  estab- 
lishment of  the  cour  pleniere  /  and  those  the  archbishop  sent 
to  the  Bastile.  But  the  spirit  of  the  nation  was  not  to  be 
overcome  ;  and  it  was  so  fully  sensible  of  the  strong  ground 
it  had  taken,  that  of  withholding  taxes,  that  it  contented 
itself  with  keeping  up  a  sort  of  quiet  resistance,  which  effec- 
tually overthrew  all  the  plans  at  that  time  formed  against  it. 
The  project  of  the  cour  pleniere  was  at  last  obliged  to  be 
given  up,  and  the  prime  minister  not  long  afterwards  fol- 
lowed its  fate  ;  and  M.  Neckar  was  recalled  into  office. 

The  attempt  to  establish  the  cour  pleniere  had  an  effect 
upon  the  nation  which  was  not  anticipated.  It  was  a  sort 
01  new  form  of  government,  that  insensibly  served  to  put 
the  old  one  out  of  sight,  and  to  unhinge  it  from  the  super- 
stitious authority  of  antiquity.  It  was  government  dethron- 
ing government ;  and  the  old  one,  by  attempting  to  make  a 
new  one,  made  a  chasm. 

The  failure  of  this  scheme  renewed  the  subject  of  conven- 
ing the  states-general :  and  this  gave  rise  to  a  new  series  of 
politics.  There  was  no  settled  form  for  convening  the 
states-general ;  all  that  it  positively  meant,  was  a  deputation 
from  what  was  then  called  the  clergy,  the  nobility,  and  the 
commons  ;  but  their  numbers,  or  their  proportions,  had  not 
been  always  the  same.  Thsy  had  been  convened  only  on 
extraordinary  occasions,  the  last  of  which  was  in  1614  ;  their 


64  KIGHTS    OF   MA&. 

numbers  were  then  in  equal  proportions,  and  they  voted  by 
orders. 

It  could  not  well  escape  the  sagacity  of  M.  Neckar,  that 
the  mode  of  1614  would  answer  neither  the  purpose  of  the 
then  government,  nor  of  the  nation.  As  matters  were  at 
that  time  circumstanced,  it  would  have  been  too  contentious 
to  argue  upon  any  thing.  The  -  debates  would  have  been 
endless  upon  privileges  and  exemptions,  in  which  neither  the 
wants  of  the  government,  nor  the  wishes  of  the  nation  for 
a  constitution,  would  have  been  attended  to.  But  as  he  did 
not  choose  to  take  the  decision  upon  himself,  he  summoned 
again  the  assembly  of  the  notables,  and  referred  it  to  them. 
This  body  was  in  general  interested  in  the  decision,  being 
chiefly  of  the  aristocracy  and  the  high  paid  clergy ;  and  they 
decided  in  favor  of  the  mode  of  1614.  This  decision  was 
against  the  sense  of  the  nation,  and  also  against  the  wishes 
of  the  court ;  for  the  aristocracy  opposed  itself  to  both,  and 
contended  for  privileges  independent  of  either.  The  sub 
ject  was  then  taken  up  by  the  parliament,  who  recommended 
that  the  number  of  the  commons  should  be  equal  to  the 
other  two ;  and  that  they  should  all  sit  in  one  house,  and 
vote  in  one  body.  The  number  finally  determined  on  was 
twelve  hundred  ;  six  hundred  to  be  chosen  by  the  commons 
(and  this  was  less  than  their  proportion  ought  to  have  been 
when  their  worth  and  consequence  is  considered  on  a  national 
scale),  three  hundred  by  the  clergy,  and  three  hundred  by 
the  aristocracy ;  but  with  respect  to  the  mode  of  assembling 
themselves,  whether  together  or  apart,  or  the  manner  in 
which  they  should  vote,  those  matters  were  referred.* 

*  Mr.  Burke,  (and  I  must  take  the  liberty  of  telling  him  that  he  is  unac- 
quainted with  French  affairs,)  speaking  upon  this  subject,  says,  "  The  first 
thing  that  struck  me  in  calling  the  states-general,  was  a  great  departure  from 
the  ancient  Bourse  ;"  and  he  soon  after  says,  "  From  the  moment  I  read  the 
list,  I  saw  distinctly,  and  very  nearly  as  it  has  happened,  all  that  was  to  follow." 
Mr.  Burke  certainly  did  not  see  all  that  was  to  follow.  I  have  endeavored  to 
impress  him,  as  well  before  as  after  the  states-general  met,  that  there  would 
be  a  revolution ;  but  w*»  not  able  to  make  him  see  it,  neither  would  be  be- 
lieve it.  How  then  he  could  distinctly  see  all  the  parts,  when  the  whole  waa 
out  of  sight,  is  beyond  my  comprehension.  And  with  respect  to  the  "  de- 
parture from  the  ancient  course,"  besides  the  natural  weakness  of  tb» 
remark,  it  shows  that  he  is  unacquainted  with  circumstances.  The  departure 
was  necessary,  from  the  experience  had  upon  it,  that  the  ancient  course  was 
a  bed  one.  The  states-general  of  1614  were  called  at  the  commencement  of 
the  civil  war  in  the  minority  of  Louis  XIII. ;  but  by  the  clash  of  arranging 
thorn  by  orders,  they  increased  the  confusion  they  were  called  to  compose. 
The  author  of  FTntrigiie  du  Cabinet,  (lutrigue  of  the  Cabinet,)  ^ho  wrote 
before  any  revolution  was  thought  of  in  France,  speaking  of  the  states-general 
of  1614,  says,  "They  held  the  public  in  suspense  five  months  •  and  bv  the 


BIGHTS    OF   MAN.  65 

The  election  that  followed,  was  not  a  contested  election, 
but  an  animated  one.  The  candidates  were  not  men,  but 
principles.  Societies  were  formed  in  Paris,  and  committees 
of  correspondence  and  communication  established  throughout 
the  nation,  for  the  purpose  of  enlightening  the  people,  and 
explaining  to  them  the  principles  of  civil  government ;  and 
so  orderly  was  the  election  conducted,  that  it  did  not  give 
rise  even  to  the  rumour  of  tumult. 

The  states-general  were  to  meet  at  Versailles  in  April. 
1789,  but  did  not  assemble  till  May.  They  located  them- 
selves in  three  separate  chambers,  or  rather  the  clergy  and 
the  aristocracy  withdrew  each  into  a  separate  chamber. 
The  majority  of  the  aristocracy  claimed  what  they  call  the 
privilege  of  voting  as  a  separate  body,  and  of  giving  their 
consent  or  their  negative  in  that  manner  ;  and  many  of  the 
bishops  and  high-beneficed  clergy  claimed  the  same  privilege 
on  the  part  of  their  order. 

The  tiers  ctat  (as  they  were  called)  disowned  any  know- 
ledge of  artificial  orders  and  privileges ;  and  they  were  not 
only  resolute  on  this  point  but  somewhat  disdainful.  They 
began  to  consider  aristocracy  as  a  kind  of  fungus  growing 
out  of  the  corruption  of  society,  that  could  not  be  admitted 
even  as  a  branch  of  it;  and  from  the  disposition  the  aristo- 
cracy had  shown,  by  upholding  lettres  de  cachet,  and  in  sundry 
other  instances,  it  was  manifest  that  no  constitution  could  be 
formed  by  admitting  men  in  any  other  character  than  as 
national  men. 

After  various  altercations  on  this  head,  the  tiers  etat,  or 
commons,  (as  they  were  then  called)  declared  themselves 
(on  a  motion  made  for  that  purpose  by  the  abbe  Sieyes,) 

"  THE   REPRESENTATIVES    OF    THE    NATION  \   and    that    the    two 

orders  could  be  considered  but  as  deputies  of  corporations, 
and  could  only  have  a  deliberative  voice  but  when  they 
assembled  in  a  national  character,  with  the  national  repre- 
sentatives" This  proceeding  extinguished  the  style  of  etats 
generaux  or  states-general,  and  erected  i0  into  the  style  it 
now  bears,  that  of  V assemblee  nationale  or  national  assembly. 
This  motion  was  not  made  in  a  precipitate  manner :  it 
was  the  result  of  cool  deliberation,  and  concerted  between 

questions  agitated  therein,  and  the  heat  with  which  they  were  put,  it 
appears  that  the  great  (les  grands]  thought  more  to  satisfy  their  particular 
passions,  than  to  procure  the  good  of  the  nation  ;  and  the  whole  time  pasted 
away  in  altercations,  'ere  monies  and  parade."  1'Intrigue  du  Cabinet,  voL  i 
p.  829. 


66  EIGHTS    OF   MAN. 

the  national  representatives  and  the  patriotic  members  of  the 
two  chambers,  who  saw  into  the  folly,  mischief,  and  injustice 
of  artificial  privileged  distinctions.  It  was  become  evident, 
that  no  constitution,  worthy  of  being  called  by  that  name, 
could  be  established  on  any  thing  less  tnan  a  national  ground. 
The  aristocracy  had  hitherto  opposed  the  despotism  of  the 
court,  and  affected  the  language  of  patriotism ;  but  it  op- 
posed it  as  its  rival ;  (as  the  English  barons  opposed  king 
John,)  and  it  now  opposed  the  nation  from  the  same  motives. 

On  carrying  this  motion,  the  national  representatives,  as 
had  been  concerted,  sent  an  invitation  to  the  two  chambers, 
to  unite  with  them  in  a  national  character,  and  proceed  to 
business.  A  majority  of  the  clergy,  chiefly  of  the  parish 
priests,  withdrew  from  the  clerical  chamber,  and  joined  the 
nation ;  and  forty-five  from  the  other  chamber  joined  in  like 
manner.  There  is  a  sort  of  secret  history  belonging  to  this 
last  circumstance,  which  is  necessary  to  its  explanation  :  it 
was  not  judged  prudent  that  all  the  patriotic  members  of  the 
chamber,  styling  itself  the  nobles,  should  quit  it  at  once  ;  and 
in  consequence  of  this  arrangement,  they  drew  off  by  degrees, 
always  leaving  some,  as  well  to  reason  the  case,  as  to  watch 
the  suspected.  In  a  little  time,  the  numbers  increased  from 
forty-five  to  eighty,  and  soon  after  to  a  greater  number ; 
which  with  a  majority  of  the  clergy,  and  the  whole  of  the 
national  representatives,  put  the  malcontents  in  a  very 
diminutive  condition. 

The  king,  who,  very  different  to  the  general  class  called 
by  that  name,  is  a  man  of  a  good  he\rt,  showed  himself  dis- 
posed to  recommend  a  union  of  the  three  chambers,  on  the 
ground  the  national  assembly  had  taken  ;  but  the  malcon- 
tents exerted  themselves  to  prevent  it,  and  began  now  to 
have  another  project  in  view.  Their  numbers  consisted  of 
a  majority  of  the  aristocratical  chamber,  and  a  minority  of 
the  clerical  chamber,  chiefly  of  bishops  and  high  benenced 
clergy ;  and  these  men  were  determined  to  put  every  thing 
at  issue,  as  well  By  strength  as  by  stratagem.  They  had  no 
objection  to  a  constitution ;  but  it  must  be  such  an  one  as 
themselves  should  dictate,  and  suited  to  their  own  views  and 
particular  situations.  On  the  other  hand,  the  nation  dis- 
owned knowing  any  thing  of  them  but  as  citizens,  and  was 
determined  to  shut  out  all  such  upstart  pretensions.  The 
more  aristocracy  appeared,  the  more  it  was  despised  ;  there 
was  a  visible  imbecility  and  want  of  intellects  in  the  majority, 
a  sort  of  je  rte  xcais  qttoi,  that  while  it  affected  to  be  more 


EIGHTS   OF    MAN.  67 

than  citizen,  was  less  than  man.  It  lost  ground  more  from 
•contempt  than  from  hatred ;  and  was  rather  jeered  at  as  an 
ass,  than  dreaded  as  a  lion.  This  is  the  general  character  of 
aristocracy,  or  what  are  called  nobles  or  nobility,  or  rather 
.no-ability,  in  all  countries. 

The  plan  of  the  malcontents  consisted  now  of  two  things ; 
either  to  deliberate  and  vote  by  chambers  (or  orders,)  more 
especially  on  all  questions  respecting  a  constitution  (by  which 
the  aristocratical  chamber  would  nave  had  a  negative  on 
any  article  of  the  constitution)  or,  in  case  they  could  not 
accomplish  this  object,  to  overthrow  the  national  assembly 
entirely. 

To  effect  one  or  the  other  of  these  objects,  they  began  now 
•to  cultivate  a  friendship  with  the  despotism  they  had  hither- 
to attempted  to  rival,  and  the  count  d'Artois  became  theii 
chief.  The  king  (who  has  since  declared  himself  deceived 
into  their  measures)  held,  according  to  the  old  form,  a  bed  of 
justice,  in  which  he  accorded  to  the  deliberation  and  vote 
par  tete  (by  head)  upon  several  objects ;  but  reserved  the 
deliberation  and  vote  upon  all  questions  respecting  a  con- 
stitution to  the  three  chambers  separately.  This  declaration 
of  the  king  was  made  against  the  advice  of  M.  Neckar,  who 
now  began  to  perceive  that  he  was  growing  out  of  fashion 
at  court,  and  that  another  minister  was  in  contemplation. 

As  the  form  of  sitting  in  separate  chambers  was  yet  ap- 
parently kept  up,  though  essentially  destroyed,  the  national 
representatives,  immediately  after  this  declaration  of  the 
king,  resorted  to  their  chambers,  to  consult  on  a  protest 
against  it ;  and  the  minority  of  the  chamber  (calling  itself 
the  nobles)  who  had  joined  the  national  cause,  retired  to  a 
private  house,  to  consult  in  like  manner.  The  malcontents 
had  by  this  time  concerted  their  measures  with  the  court, 
•which  count  d'Artois  undertook  to  conduct ;  and  as  they 
naw,  from  the  discontent  which  the  declaration  excited,  and 
the  opposition  making  against  it,  that  they  could  not  obtain 
a  control  over  the  intended  constitution  by"a  separate  vote, 
they  prepared  themselves  for  their  final  object — that  of  con- 
spiring against  the  national  assembly,  and  overthrowing  it. 

The  next  morning,  the  door  of  the  chamber  of  the  national 
assembly  was  shut  against  them,  and  guarded  by  troops ; 
and  the  members  were  refused  admittance.  On  this  they 
withdrew  to  a  tennis-ground  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Ver- 
sailles, as  the  most  convenient  place  they  could  find,  and, 
after  renewing  their  session,  took  an  oath  never  to  separate 


08  EIGHTS   OF  MAN. 

from  each  other,  under  any  circumstances  whatever,  death 
excepted,  until  they  had  established  a  constitution.  As  the 
experiment  of  shutting  up  the  house  had  no  other  effect  than 
that  of  producing  a  closer  connexion  in  the  members,  it  was 
opened  again  the  next  day,  and  the  public  business  re-com- 
menced in  the  usual  place. 

We  now  are  to  have  in  view  the  forming  the  new  minis- 
try, which  was  to  accomplish  the  overthrow  of  the  national 
assembly.  But  as  force  would  be  necessary,  orders  were 
issued  to  assemble  thirty  thousand  troops,  the  command  of 
which  was  given  to  Broglio,  one  of  the  new-intended  minis- 
try, who  was  recalled  from  the  country  for  this  purpose. 
But  as  some  management  was  necessary  to  keep  this  plan 
concealed  till  the  moment  it  should  be  ready  for  execution, 
it  is  to  this  policy  that  a  declaration  made  by  the  count 
d'Artois  must  be  attributed,  and  which  is  here  proper  to  be 
introduced. 

It  could  not  but  occur,  that  while  the  malcontents  con- 
tinued tc  resort  to  their  chambers  separate  from  the  national 
assembly,  that  more  jealousy  would  be  excited  than  if  they 
were  mixed  with  it,  and  that  the  plot  might  be  suspected. 
But  as  they  had  taken  their  ground,  and  now  wanted  a  pre- 
tence for  quitting  it,  it  was  necessary  that  one  should  be  de- 
vised. This  was  effectually  accomplished  by  a  declaration 
made  by  count  d'Artois,  that  "  if  they  took  no  part  in  the 
national  assembly r,  the  life  of  the  king  would  be  endangered" 
on  which  they  quitted  their  chambers,  and  mixed  with  the 
assembly  in  one  body. 

At  the  time  this  declaration  was  made,  it  was  generally 
treated  as  a  piece  of  absurdity  in  the  count  d'Artois,  and 
calculated  merely  to  relieve  the  outstanding  members  of  the 
two  chambers  from  the  diminutive  situation  they  were  put 
in  }  and  if  nothing  more  had  followed,  this  conclusion  would 
have  been  good.  But  as  things  best  explain  themselves  by 
events,  this  apparent  union  was  only  a  cover  to  the  ma- 
chinations that  were  secretly  going  on,  and  the  declaration 
accommodated  itself  to  answer  that  purpose.  In  a  little 
time  the  national  assembly  found  itself  surrounded  by  troops, 
and  thousands  daily  arriving.  On  this  a  very  strong  decla- 
ration was  made  by  the  national  assembly  to  the  king,  re- 
monstrating on  the  impropriety  of  the  measure,  and  demand- 
ing the  reason.  The  king,  who  was  not  in  the  secret  of  this 
business,  as  himself  afterwards  declared,  gave  substantially 
for  answer,  that  he  had  no  other  object  in  view  than  to  pre* 


BIGHTS   OF   MAH. 


gerve  public  tranquillity,  which  appeared  to  be  much  dis- 
turbecf. 

But  in  a  few  days  from  this  time,  the  plot  unravelled 
itself.  M.  Neckar  and  the  ministry  were  displaced,  and  a 
new  one  formed  of  the  enemies  of  the  revolution ;  and  Brog- 
lio,  with  between  twenty-five  and  thirty  thousand  foreign 
troops,  was  arrived  to  support  them.  The  mask  was  now 
thrown  off,  and  matters  were  come  to  a  crisis.  The  event 
was,  that  in  the  space  of  three  days,  the  new  ministry  and 
all  their  abettors  found  it  prudent  to  fly  the  nation ;  the 
Bastile  was  taken,  and  Bro<nio  and  his  foreign  troops  dis 
persed ;  as  is  already  related  in  a  former  part  of  this  work. 

There  are  some  curious  circumstances  in  the  history  of 
this  short-lived  ministry,  and  this  brief  attempt  at  a  counter- 
revolution. The  palace  of  Versailles,  where  the  court  was 
sitting,  was  not  more  than  four  hundred  yards  distant  from 
the  hall  where  the  national  assembly  was  sitting.  The  two 
places  were  at  this  moment  like  the  separate  head-quarters 
of  two  combatant  enemies ;  yet  the  court  was  as  perfectly 
ignorant  of  the  information  which  had  arrived  from  Paris  to 
the  national  assembly,  as  if  it  had  resided  at  a  hundred 
miles  distance.  The  then  marquis  de  la  Fayette,  who  (as 
has  been  already  mentioned)  was  chosen  to  preside  in  the 
national  assembly  on  this  particular  occasion,  named,  by 
order  of  the  assembly,  three  successive  deputations  to  the 
king,  on  the  dav,  and  up  to  the  evening  on  which  the  Bastile 
was  taken,  to  inform  and  confer  with  him  on  the  state  of 
affairs ;  but  the  ministry,  who  knew  not  so  much  as  that  it 
was  attacked,  precluded  all  communication,  and  were  solac- 
ing themselves  how  dexterously  they  had  succeeded :  but  in 
a  lew  hours  the  accounts  arrived  so  thick  and  fast,  that  they 
had  to  start  from  their  desks  and  run :  some  set  off  in  one 
disguise,  and  some  in  another,  and  none  in  their  own  char- 
acter. Their  anxiety  now  was  to  outride  the  news,  lest  they 
should  be  stopped,  which,  though  it  flew  fast,  flew  not  so  fast 
as  themselves. 

It  is  worth  remarking,  that  the  national  assembly  neither 
pursued  those  fugitive  conspirators,  nor  took  any  notice  of 
them,  nor  sought  to  retaliate  in  any  shape  whatever.  Occu- 
pied with  establishing  a  constitution,  founded  en  the  rights 
of  man  and  the  authority  of  the  people,  the  only  authority 
on  which  government  has  a  right  to  exist  in  any  country, 
the  national  assembly  felt  none  of  those  mean  passions  which 
mark  the  character  of  impertinent  governments,  founding 


70  EIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

themselves  on  their  own  authority,  or  on  the  absurdity  of 
hereditary  succession.  It  is  the  faculty  of  the  human  mind 
to  become  v-^at  it  contemplates,  and  to  act  in  unison  with 
its  object. 

The  conspiracy  being  thus  dispersed,  one  of  the  first  works 
of  the  national  assembly,  instead  of  vindictive  proclamations, 
as  has  been  the  case  with  other  governments  published  a 
declaration  of  the  rights  of  man,  as  the  basis  on  which  the 
new  constitution  was  to  be  built,  and  which  is  here  sub- 
joined. 

Declaration  of  the  rights  of  man  and  of  citizens:  by  the 
national  assembly  of  France. 

"  The  representatives  of  the  people  of  France,  formed  into 
a  national  assembly,  considering  that  ignorance,  neglect,  or 
contempt  of  human  rights,  are  the  sole  causes  of  public  mis- 
fortunes, and  corruptions  of  government,  have  resolved  to  set 
forth,  in  a  solemn  declaration,  these  natural,  imprescriptible, 
and  unalienable  rights:  that  this  declaration  being  con 
stantly  present  to  the  minds  of  the  body  social,  they  may  be 
ever  kept  attentive  to  their  rights  and  their  duties :  that  the 
acts  of  the  legislative  and  executive  powers  of  government,, 
being  capable  of  being  every  moment  compared  with  the 
end  of  political  institutions,  may  be  more  respected:  and 
also,  that  the  future  claims  of  the  citizens,  being  directed  by 
simple  and  incontestable  principles,  may  always  tend  to  the 
maintenance  of  the  constitution  and  the  general  happiness. 

"  For  these  reasons  the  national  assembly  doth  recognize 
and  declare,  in  the  presence  of  the  Supreme  Being,  and  with 
the  hope  of  his  blessing  and  favor,  the  following  sacred  rights 
of  men  and  of  citizens : 

"  I.  Men  are  born  and  always  continue  free  and  equal  in 
respect  of  their  rights.  Civil  distinctions,  therefore,  can  only 
be  founded  on  public  utility. 

"  II.  The  end  of  all  political  associations  is  the  preserva- 
tion of  the  natural  and  imprescriptible  rights  of  man ;  and 
these  rights  are  liberty,  property,  security,  and  resistance  of 
oppression. 

"  III.  The  nation  is  essentially  the  source  of  all  sove- 
reignty :  nor  can  any  individual  or  any  body  of  men,  be 
entitled  to  any  authority  which  is  not  expressly  derived 
from  it. 

"  IY.  Political  liberty  consists  in  the  power  of  doing  what 


BIGHTS   OF   MAM.  71 

e^er  does  not  injure  another.  The  exercise  of  the  natural 
rights  of  every  man  has  no  ether  limits  than  those  which  are 
necessary  to  secure  to  every  other  man  the  free  exercise  of  the 
same  rights ;  and  these  limits  are  detenninable  only  by  law. 

"  V.  The  law  ought  to  prohibit  only  actions  hurtful  to 
society.  What  is  not  prohibited  by  the  law,  should  not  be 
hindered ;  nor  should  any  one  be  compelled  to  that  which 
the  law  does  not  require. 

"  VI.  The  law  is  an  expression  of  the  will  of  the  com- 
munity. All  citizens  have  a  right  to  concur,  either  person- 
ally, or  by  their  representatives,  in  its  formation.  It  should 
be  the  same  to  all,  whether  it  protects  or  punishes ;  and  all 
being  equal  in  its  sight,  are  equally  eligible  to  all  honors, 
places,  and  employments,  according  to  their  different  abi- 
lities, without  any  other  distinction  than  that  created  by 
their  virtues  and  talents. 

"  VII.  No  man  should  be  accused,  arrested,  or  held  in  con- 
finement, except  in  cases  determined  by  the  law,  and  accord- 
ing to  the  forms  which  it  has  prescribed.  All  who  promote, 
solicit,  execute,  or  cause  to  be  executed,  arbitrary  orders, 
ought  to  be  punished ;  and  every  citizen  called  upon  or  ap- 
prehended by  virtue  of  the  law,  ought  immediately  to  obey, 
and  not  render  himself  culpable  by  resistance. 

"  VIII.  The  law  ought  to  impose  no  other  penalties  than 
6uch  as  are  absolutely  and  evidently  necessary ;  and  no  one 
ought  to  be  punished,  but  in  virtue  of  a  law  promulgated 
beiore  the  ofience  and  legally  applied. 

"  IX.  Every  man  being  presumed  innocent  till  he  has  been 
convicted,  whenever  his  detention  becomes  indispensable,  all 
rigor  to  him,  more  than  is  necessary  to  secure  his  person, 
ought  to  be  provided  against  by  the  law. 

"  X.  No  man  ought  to  be  molested  on  account  of  his 
opinions,  not  even  on  account  of  his  religious  opinions,  pro- 
vided his  avowal  of  them  does  not  disturb  the  public  order 
established  by  the  law. 

u  XI.  The  unrestrained  communication  of  thoughts  and 
opinions  being  one  of  the  most  precious  rights  of  man,  every 
citizen  may  speak,  write,  and  publish  freely,  provided  he  18 
responsible  for  the  abuse  of  this  liberty  in  cases  determined 
by  the  law. 

"  XII.  A  public  force  being  necessary  to  give  security  to 
the  rights  of  men  and  of  citizens,  that  force  is  instituted  for 
the  benefit  of  the  community,  and  not  for  the  particular 
Benefit  of  the  persons  with  whom  it  is  intrusted. 


T2  BIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

"  XIII.  A  common  contribution  being  necessary  for  the 
/support  of  the  public  force,  and  for  defraying  the  other 
expenses  of  government,  it  ought  to  be  divided  equally 
among  the  members  of  the  community,  according  to  their 
abilities. 

"  XIY.  Every  citizen  has  a  right,  either  by  himself  or  his 
representative,  to  a  free  voice  in  determining  the  necessity 
ofpublic  contributions,  the  appropriation  of  them,  and  their 
amount,  mode  of  assessment,  and  duration. 

"  XY.  Every  community  has  a  right  to  demand  of  all  its 
agents  an  account  of  their  conduct. 

"  XYI.  Every  community  in  which  a  separation  of 
powers  and  a  security  of  rights  is  not  provided  for,  wants  a 
constitution. 

"  XYII.  The  right  to  property  being  inviolable  and 
sacred,  no  one  ought  to  be  deprived  of  it,  except  in  cases  of 
evident  public  necessity  legally  ascertained,  and  on  condition 
of  a  previous  just  indemnity. 

Observations  on  the  declaration  of  rights. 

The  three  first  articles  comprehend  in  general  terms  the 
whole  of  a  declaration  of  rights  ;  all  the  succeeding  articles 
either  originate  out  of  them,  or  follow  as  elucidations.  The 
4th,  5th,  and  6th,  define  more  particularly  what  is  only 
generally  expressed  in  the  1st,  2d,  and  3d. 

The  7th,  8th,  9th,  10th,  and  llth,  articles  are  declaratory 
of  principles  upon  which  laws  shall  be  construed  conform- 
able to  riylits  already  declared.  But  it  is  questioned  by 
some  very  good  people  in  France,  as  well  as  in  other  coun- 
tries, whether  the  10th  article  sufficiently  guarantees  the 
right  it  is  intended  to  accord  with  ;  besides  which,  it  takes 
off  from  the  divine  dignity  of  religion,  and  weakens  its  ope- 
rative force  upon  the  mind  to  make  it  a  subject  of  human 
laws.  It  then  presents  itself  to  man,  like  light  intercepted 
by  a  cloudy  medium,  in  which  the  source  of  it  is  obscured 
from  his  sight,  and  he  sees  nothing  to  reverence  in  the  dusky 
rays.* 

*  There  is  a  single  idea,  which,  if  it  strikes  rightly  upon  the  mind,  either  in 
a  legal  or  a  religious  sense,  will  prevent  any  man  or  any  body  of  men,  or  any 
government,  from  going  wrong  on  the  subject  of  religion ;  which  is,  that 
before  any  human  institutions  of  government  were  known  in  the  world,  there 
existed,  if  I  may  so  express  it,  a  compact  between  God  and  man,  from  the 
beginning  of  time  :  and  that  as  the  relation  ami  condition  which  man  in  his 


EIGHTS   OF   MAtf.  73 

The  remaining  articles,  beginning  with  the  twelfth,  are 
substantially  contained  in  the  principles  of  the  preceding 
articles ;  but,  in  the  particular  situation  in  whicn  France 
then  was,  having  to  undo  what  was  wrong,  as  well  as  to  set 
up  what  was  right,  it  was  proper  to  be  more  particular  than 
in  another  condition  of  things  would  be  necessary. 

"While  the  declaration  of  rights  was  before  the  national 
assembly,  some  of  its  members  remarked,  that  if  a  declara- 
tion of  rights  was  published,  it  should  be  accompanied  by  a 
declaration  of  duties.  The  observation  discovered  a  mind 
that  reflected,  and  it  only  erred  by  not  reflecting  far  enough. 
A  declaration  of  rights  is,  by  reciprocity,  a  declaration  of 
duties  also.  Whatever  is  my  right  as  a  man,  is  also  the 
right  of  another ;  and  it  becomes  my  duty  to  guarantee,  as 
well  as  to  possess. 

The  three  first  articles  are  the  basis  of  liberty,  as  well  in- 
dividual as  national ;  nor  can  any  country  be  called  free, 
whose  government  does  not  take  its  beginning  from  the 
principles  they  contain,  and  continue  to  preserve  them  pure : 
and  the  whole  of  the  declaration  of  rights  is  of  more  value 
to  the  world,  and  will  do  more  good,  than  all  the  laws  and 
statutes  that  have  yet  been  promulgated. 

In  the  declaratory  exordium  which  prefaces  the  declara- 
tion of  rights,  we  see  the  solemn  and  majestic  spectacle  of  a 
nation  opening  its  commission,  under  the  auspices  of  its 
Creator,  to  establish  a  government ;  a  scene  so  new,  and  so 
transcendently  unequalled  by  any  thing  in  the  European 
world,  that  the  name  of  a  revolution  is  inexpressive  of  its 
character,  and  it  rises  into  a  regeneration  01  man.  What 
are  the  present  governments  of  Europe,  but  a  scene  of  ini- 
quity and  oppression?  What  is  that  of  England?  Does 
not  its  own  inhabitants  say,  it  is  a  market  where  every  man 
has  his  price,  and  where  corruption  is  common  traffic,  at  the 
expense  of  a  deluded  people  j  No  wonder,  then,  that  the 
French  revolution  is  traduced.  Had  it  confined  itself  merely 
to  the  destruction  of  flagrant  despotism,  perhaps  Mr.  Burke 

individual  person  stands  in  towards  his  Maker  cannot  be  changed,  by  any  hu- 
man  laws  or  human  authority,  that  religious  devotion,  which  is  a  part  of  this 
compact,  cannot  so  much  as  be  made  a  subject  of  human  laws ;  and  that  all 
laws  must  conform  themselves  to  this  prior  existing  compact,  and  not  assume 
to  make  the  compact  conform  to  the  laws,  which,  besides  being  human,  are 
subsequent  thereto.  The  first  act  of  man,  when  he  looked  around  and  saw 
himself  a  creature  which  he  did  not  make,  aud  a  world  furnished  for  his  re- 
ception, must  have  been  devotion ;  and  devotion  must  ever  continue  sacred 
to  every  individual  man,  as  it  appears  right  to  him  ;  and  governments  do  mis- 
chief by  interfering. 


74  EIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

and  some  others  had  been  silent.  Their  cry  now  is,  "  It  has 
gone  too  far :"  that  is  gone  too  far  for  them.  It  stares  cor- 
ruption in  the  face,  and  the  venal  tribe  are  all  alarmed. 
Their  fear  discovers  itself  in  their  outrage,  and  they  are  but 
publishing  the  groans  of  a  wounded  vice.  But  from  such 
opposition,  the  French  revolution,  instead  of  suffering,  re- 
ceives homage.  The  more  it  is  struck,  the  more  sparks  will 
it  emit ;  and  the  fear  is,  it  will  not  be  struck  enough.  It 
has  nothing  to  dread  from  attacks.  Truth  has  given  it  an 
establishment ;  and  time  will  record  it  with  a  name  as  last- 
ing as  its  own. 

Having  now  traced  the  progress  of  the  French  revolution 
through  most  of  its  principal  stages,  from  its  commence- 
ment to  the  taking  of  the  Bastile,  and  its  establishment  by 
the  declaration  ol  rights,  I  will  close  the  subject  with  the 
energetic  apostrophe  of  M.  de  la  Fayette — May  this  great 
monument  raised  to  liberty,  serve  as  a  lesson  to  the  oppressor \ 
and  an  example  to  the  oppressed!  * 


MISCELLANEOUS  CHAPTER. 

To  prevent  interrupting  the  argument  in  the  preceding 
part  ol  this  work,  or  the  narrative  that  follows  it,  I  reserved 
Borne  observations  to  be  thrown  together  into  a  miscellaneous 
chapter ;  by  which  variety  might  not  be  censured  for  con- 
fusion. Mr.  Burke's  book  is  all  miscellany.  His  intention 
was  to  make  an  attack  on  the  French  revolution :  but  in- 
stead of  proceeding  with  an  orderly  arrangement,  he  has 
stormed  it  with  a  mob  of  ideas,  tumbling  over  and  destroy- 
ing one  another. 

But  this  confusion  and  contradiction  in  Mr.  Burke's  book, 
is  easily  accounted  for.  When  a  man  in  any  cause  attempts 
to  steer  his  course  by  any  thing  else  than  some  popular  truth 
or  principle,  he  is  sure  to  be  lost.  It  is  beyond  the  compass 
of  his  capacity,  to  keep  all  the  parts  of  an  argument  to- 
gether, and  make  them  unite  in  one  issue,  by  any  other 
means  than  having  his  guide  always  in  view.  Neither 

*  See  p.  12  of  this  work. — N.  B.  Since  the  taking  the  Bastile,  the  occur- 
rences have  been  published :  but  the  matters  recorded  in  this  narrative  are 
prior  to  that  period,  and  some  of  them,  as  may  easily  be  seen,  can  be  but 
very  little  known. 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN.  75 

memory  ncr  invention  will  supply  the  want  of  it.  The 
former  fails  him,  and  the  latter  betrays  him. 

Notwithstanding  the  nonsense,  for  it  deserves  no  better 
name,  that  Mr.  Burke  has  asserted  about  hereditary  rights, 
and  hereditary  succession,  and  that  a  nation  has  not  a  right 
to  form  a  government  for  itself,  it  happened  to  fall  inrns 
way  to  give  some  account  of  what  government  is.  "  Govern- 
ment," says  he,  "  is  a  contrivance  of  human  wisdom." 

Admitting  that  government  is  a  contrivance  of  human 
wisdom,  it  must  necessarily  follow,  that  hereditary  suc- 
cession, and  hereditary  rights  (as  they  are  called)  can  make 
no  part  of  it,  because  it  is  impossible  to  make  wisdom  here- 
ditary ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  that  cannot  be  a  wise  con- 
trivance, which  in  its  operation  may  commit  the  govern- 
ment of  a  nation  to  the  wisdom  of  an  idiot.  The  ground 
which  Mr.  Burke  now  takes  is  fatal  to  every  part  of  his 
cause.  The  argument  changes  from  hereditary  rights  to 
hereditary  wisdom ;  and  the  question  is,  who  is  the  wisest 
man  ?  He  must  now  show  that  every  one  in  the  line  of 
hereditary  succession  was  a  Solomon,  or  his  title  is  not  good 
to  be  a  king.  What  a  stroke  has  Mr.  Burke  now  made !  to 
use  a  sailor's  phrase  he  has  swabbed  the  deck,  and  scarcely 
left  a  name  legible  in  the  list  of  kings ;  and  he  has  mowed 
down  and  thinned  the  house  of  peers,  with  a  scythe  as  for- 
midable as  death  and  time. 

But  Mr.  Burke  appears  to  have  been  aware  of  this  retort, 
and  he  has  taken  care  to  guard  against  it,  by  making  gov- 
ernment to  be  not  only  a  contrivance  of  human  wisdom,  but 
a  'monopoly  of  wisdom.  He  puts  the  nation  as  fools  on  one 
side,  and  places  his  government  of  wisdom,  all  wise  men  of 
Gotham,  on  the  other  side ;  and  he  then  proclaims,  and  says, 
that  "  men  have  a  RIGHT  that  their  WANTS  should  be  jyroviaed 
for  by  this  wisdom."  Having  thus  made  proclamation,  he 
next  proceeds  to  explain  to  them  what  their  wants  are,  and 
also  what  their  i*ights  are.  In  this  he  has  succeeded  dex- 
terously, for  he  makes  their  wants  to  be  a  want  of  wisdom ; 
but  as  this  is  but  cold  comfort,  he  then  informs  them,  that 
they  have  a  right  (not  to  any  of  the  wisdom)  but  to  be  gov- 
erned by  it ;  and  in  order  to  impress  them  with  a  solemn 
reverence  for  this  monopoly-government  of  wisdom,  and  of 
its  vast  capacity  for  all  purposes,  possible  or  impossible, 
right  or  wrong,  he  proceeds  with  astrological,  mysterious 
importance,  to  tell  them  its  powers  in  these  words — "  The 
rights  of  men  in  government  are  their  advantages:  and 


76  EIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

these  are  often  in  balances  between  differences  of  good ;  and 
in  compromises  sometimes  between  good  and  evil,  and  8ome« 
times  between  evil  and  evil.  Political  reason  is  a  computing 
principle ;  adding,  subtracting,  multiplying,  and  dividing, 
morally  and  not  metaphysically  or  mathematically,  true 
moral  demonstrations." 

As  the  wondering  audience  whom  Mr.  Burke  supposes 
himself  talking  to,  may  not  understand  all  this  jargon,  I  will 
undertake  to  be  its  interpreter.  The  meaning  then,  good 
people,  of  all  this,  is,  that  government  is  governed  by  no 
pnnciple  whatever  ;  that  it  can  make  evil  good,  or  good 
evil,  just  as  it  pleases.  In  short,  that  government  is  arbi- 
trary power. 

But  there  are  some  things  which  Mr.  Burke  has  forgot- 
ten: 1st,  he  has  not  shown  where  the  wisdom  originally 
came  from ;  and,  2d,  he  has  not  shown  by  what  authority  it 
first  began  to  act.  In  the  manner  he  introduced  the  mat- 
ters, it  is  either  government  stealing  wisdom,  or  wisdom 
stealing  government.  It  is  without  an  origin,  and  its  powers 
without  authority.  In  short,  it  is  usurpation. 

Whether  it  be  from  a  sense  of  shame,  or  from  a  con- 
sciousness of  some  radical  defect  in  government  necessary 
to  be  kept  out  of  sight,  or  from  both,  or  from  some  other 
cause,  I  undertake  not  to  determine;  but  so  it  is,  that  a 
monarchical  reasoner  never  traces  government  to  its  source, 
or  from  its  source.  It  is  one  of  the  shibboleths  by  which  he 
may  be  known.  A  thousand  years  hence,  those  who  shall 
live  in  America,  or  in  France,  will  look  back  with  contem- 
plative pride  on  the  origin  of  their  governments,  and  say, 
this  was  the  work  of  our  glorious  ancestors  !  But  what  can 
a  monarchical  talker  say  ?  What  has  he  to  exult  in  ?  Alas ! 
he  has  nothing.  A  certain  something  forbids  him  to  look 
back  to  a  beginning,  lest  some  robber,  or  some  Robin  Hood, 
should  rise  from  the  long  obscurity  of  time,  and  say,  /  am 
the  origin.  Hard  as  Mr.  Burke  labored  under  the  regency 
bill  and  hereditary  succession  two  years  ago,  and  much  as 
he  dived  for  precedents,  he  still  had  not  boldness  enough  to 
bring  up  William  of  Normandy  and  say,  there  is  the  head  of 
the  Ust,  there  is  the  fountain  of  honor,  the  son  of  a  prostitute, 
and  the  plunderer  of  the  English  nation. 

The  opinions  of  men,  with  respect  to  government,  are 
changing  fast  in  all  countries.  The  revolutions  of  America 
and  France  have  thrown  a  beam  of  light  over  the  world, 
which  reaches  into  man.  The  enormous  expense  of  govern 


EIGHTS   OF   MAN.  77 

merits  have  provoked  people  to  think  by  making  them  feel ; 
and  when  once  the  vail  begins  to  rend,  it  admits  not  of  re- 
repair.  Ignorance  is  of  a  peculiar  nature :  once  dispelled,  it 
is  impossible  to  re-establisn  it.  It  is  not  originally  a  thing 
of  itself,  but  is  only  the  absence  of  knowledge ;  and  though 
man  may  be  kept  ignorant,  he  cannot  be  made  ignorant. 
The  mind,  in  discovering  truths,  acts  in  the  same  manner  as 
it  acts  through  the  eye  in  discovering  an  object ;  when  once 
any  object  has  been  seen,  it  is  impossible  to  put  the  mind 
back  to  the  same  condition  it  was  in  before  it  saw  it.  Those 
who  talk  of  a  counter-revolution  in  France,  show  how  little 
they  understand  of  man.  There  does  not  exist  in  the  com- 
pass of  language,  an  arrangement  of  words  to  express  so 
much  as  the  means  of  effecting  a  counter-revolution.  The 
means  must  be  an  obliteration  of  knowledge;  and  it  has 
never  yet  been  discovered  how  to  make  a  man  unknow  his 
knowledge,  or  unthink  his  thoughts. 

Mr.  Burke  is  laboring  in  vain  to  stop  the  progress  of 
knowledge ;  and  it  comes  with  the  worse  grace  from  him,  as 
there  is  a  certain  transaction  known  in  the  city,  which  rend- 
ers him  suspected  of  being  a  pensioner  in  a  fictitious  name. 
This  may  account  for  some  strange  doctrine  he  has  advanced 
in  his  book,  which,  though  he  points  it  at  the  Revolution 
societv,  is  effectually  directed  against  the  whole  nation. 

"  The  king  of  England,"  says  ne,  "  holds  his  crown  (for  it 
does  not  belong  to  the  nation,  according  to  Mr.  Burke)  in 
contempt  of  the  choice  of  the  Revolution  societv,  who  have 
not  a  single  vote  for  a  king  among  them  either  individually 
or  collectively  ;  and  his  majesty's  heirs,  each  in  his  time  and 
order,  will  come  to  the  crown  with  the  same  contempt  of  their 
choice,  with  which  his  majesty  has  succeeded  to  that  which 
he  now  wears." 

As  to  who  is  king  of  England  or  elsewhere,  or  whether 
there  is  any  at  all,  or  whether  the  people  choose  a  Cherokee 
chief,  or  a  Hessian  hussar  for  a  king,  is  not  a  matter  that  I 
trouble  myself  about,  be  that  to  themselves  ;  but  with  respect 
to  the  doctrine,  so  far  as  it  relates  to  the  rights  of  men  and 
nations,  it  is  as  abominable  as  any  thing  ever  uttered  in  the 
most  enslaved  country  under  heaven.  Whether  it  sounds  worse 
to  my  ear,  by  not  being  accustomed  to  hear  such  despotism, 
than  it  does  to  the  ear  of  another  person,  I  am  not  so  well  a 
judge  of:  but  of  its  abominable  principle,  I  am  at  no  loss 
to  Judge. 

It  is  not  the  Revolution  society  that  Mr.  Burke  means;  it 


78  BIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

is  the  nation,  as  well  in  its  original,  as  in  its  representative 
character ;  and  he  has  taken  care  to  make  himself  under- 
stood, by  saying,  that  they  hare  not  a  vote  either  collectively 
or  individually.  The  Revolution  society  is  composed  of 
citizens  of  all  denominations,  and  of  members  of  botn  houses 
of  parliament,  and  consequently,  if  there  is  not  a  right  to 
vote  in  any  of  the  characters,  there  can  be  no  right  to  any, 
either  in  the  nation  or  in  its  parliament.  This  ought  to  be 
a  caution  to  every  country,  how  it  imports  foreign  families 
to  be  kings.  It  is  somewhat  curious  to  observe,  that  although 
the  people  of  England  have  been  in  the  habit  of  talking 
about  the  kings,  it  is  always  a  foreign  house  of  kings  ;  hating 
foreigners,  yet  governed  by  them.  It  is  now  the  house  of 
Brunswick,  one  of  the  petty  tribes  of  Germany. 

It  has  hitherto  been  the  practice  of  the  English  parlia- 
ments, to  regulate  what  was  called  the  succession,  (taking  it 
for  granted,  that  the  nation  then  continued  to  accord  to  the 
form  of  annexing  a  monarchical  branch  to  its  government ; 
for  without  this,  the  parliament  could  not  have  had  authority 
to  have  sent  either  to  Holland  or  to  Hanover,  or  to  impose 
a  king  upon  a  nation  against  its  will.)  And  this  must  be 
the  utmost  limit  to  which  parliament  can  go  upon  the  case  ; 
but  the  right  of  the  nation  goes  to  the  whole  case,  because  it 
is  the  right  of  changing  the  whole  form  of  government.  The 
right  of  a  parliament  is  only  a  right  in  trust,  a  right  by 
delegation,  and  that  but  from  a  very  small  part  of  the  nation  ; 
and  one  of  its  houses  has  not  even  this.  But  the  right  cf 
the  nation  is  an  original  right,  as  universal  as  taxation.  The 
nation  is  the  paymaster  of  every  thing,  and  every  thing  must 
conform  to  its  general  will. 

I  remember  taking  notice  of  a  speech  in  what  is  called  the 
English  house  of  peers,  by  the  then  Earl  of  Shelbourne,  and 
I  think  it  was  at  the  time  he  was  minister,  which  is  appli- 
cable to  this  case.  I  do  not  directly  charge  my  memory 
with  every  particular ;  but  the  words  and  the  purport  as 
nearly  as  I  remember,  were  these :  that  the  form  of  govern- 
ment was  a  matter  wholly  at  the  will  of  a  nation  at  all  times : 
that  if  it  chose  a  monarchical  form,  it  had  a  right  to  have  it 
so,  and  if  it  afterwards  chose  to  "be  a  republic,  it  had  a  right  to 
be  a  republic,  and  to  say  to  a  Icing,  we  have  no  longer  any 
occasion  for  you. 

When  Mr.  Burke  says  that  "his  majesty's  heirs  and  suc- 
cessors, each  in  their  time  and  order,  will  come  to  the  crown 
with  the  same  contempt  of  their  choice  with  which  hif 


RIGHTS   OF  MAW.  7fr 

majesty  has  succeeded  to  that  he  wears,  it  is  saying  too 
much  even  to  the  humblest  individual  in  the  country  ;  part 
of  whose  daily  labor  goes  towards  making  up  the  million 
sterling  a-year  which  the  country  gives  a  person  it  styles  a 
king.  Government  with  insolence,  is  despotism  ;  but  when 
contempt  is  added,  it  becomes  worse  ;  and  to  pay  for  con- 
tempt is  the  excess  of  slavery.  This  species  of  government 
comes  from  Germany  ;  and  reminds  me  of  what  one  of  the 
Brunswick  soldiers  told  me,  who  was  taken  prisoner  by  the 
Americans  in  the  late  war ;  "  Ah !"  said  he,  "  America  is  a 
fine  free  country,  it  is  worth  people's  fighting  for ;  I  know 
the  diiference  by  knowing  my  own  ;  in  my  country,  if  the 
prince  say,  eat  straw,  we  eat  straw." — God  help  that  country, 
thought  I,  be  it  England  or  elsewhere,  whose  liberties  are 
not  to  be  protected  by  German  principles  of  government  and 
princes  of  Brunswick. 

As  Mr.  Burke  sometimes  speaks  of  England,  sometimes  of 
France,  and  sometimes  of  the  world,  and  of  government  in 
general,  it  is  difficult  to  answer  his  book  without  apparently 
meeting  him  on  the  same  ground.  Although  principles  of 
government  are  general  subjects,  it  is  next  to  impossible,  in 
many  cases,  to  separate  them  from  the  idea  of  place  and 
circumstance  ;  and  the  more  so  when  circumstances  are  put 
for  arguments,  which  is  frequently  the  case  with  Mr.  Burke. 

In  tne  former  part  of  his  book,  addressing  himself  to  the 
people  of  France,  he  says,  "  no  experience  has  taught  us, 
(meaning  the  English,)  that  in  any  other  course  or  method 
than  that  of  an  hereditary  crown,  can  our  liberties  be  regu- 
larly perpetuated  and  preserved  sacred  as  our  hereditary 
right.  I  ask  Mr.  Burke  who  is  to  take  them  away  ?  M.  de 
la  Fayette,  in  speaking  of  France,  says,  "  For  a  nation 
to  l)e  free,  it  is  sufficient  that  she  wills  it"  But  Mr.  Burke 
represents  England  as  wanting  capacity  to  take  care  of  itself; 
and  that  its  liberties  must  be  taken  care  of  by  a  king,  hold- 
ing it  in  "  contempt."  If  England  is  sunk  to  this,  it  is  pre- 
Siring  itself  to  eat  straw,  as  in  Hanover  or  in  Brunswick, 
ut  besides  the  folly  of  the  declaration,  it  happens  that  the 
facts  are  all  against  Mr.  Burke.  It  was  by  the  government 
being  hereditary,  that  the  liberties  of  the  people  were  endan- 
gered. Charles  I.  and  James  II.  are  instances  of  this  truth ; 
yet  neither  of  them  went  so  far  as  to  hold  the  nation  in 
contempt. 

AB  it  is  sometimes  of  advantage  to  the  people  of  one  conn- 
try,  to  hear  what  those  of  other  countries  hare  to  say  respect- 


80  BIGHTS   OF  MAN. 

ing  it,  it  is  possible  that  the  people  of  France  may  learn 
something  from  Mr.  Bnrke's  book,  and  that  the  people  01 
England  may  also  learn  something  from  the  answers  it  will 
occasion.  When  nations  fall  out  about  freedom,  a  wide  field 
of  debate  is  opened.  The  argument  commences  with  the 
rights  of  war,  without  its  evils ;  and  as  knowledge  is  the 
object  contended  for,  the  party  that  sustains  the  defeat 
obtains  the  prize. 

Mr.  Burke  talks  about  what  he  calls  an  hereditary  crown, 
as  if  it  were  some  production  of  nature ;  or  as  if,  like  time, 
it  had  power  to  operate  not  only  independently,  but  in  spite 
of  man ;  or  as  if  it  were  a  thing  or  a  subject  universally 
consented  to.  Alas !  it  has  none  of  those  properties,  but  is 
the  reverse  of  them  all.  It  is  a  thing  of  imagination,  the 
propriety  of  which  is  more  than  doubted,  and  the  legality  of 
which  in  a  few  years  will  be  denied. 

But,  to  arrange  this  matter  in  a  clearer  view  than  what 
general  expressions  can  convey,  it  will  be  necessary  to 
state  the  distinct  heads  under  which  (what  is  called)  an 
hereditary  crown,  or,  more  properly  speaking,  an  hereditary 
succession  to  the  government  of  a  nation,  can  be  considered, 
which  are, 

1st.  The  right  of  a  particular  family  to  establish  itself. 

2d.  The  right  of  a  nation  to  establish  a  particular  family. 

"With  respect  to  the  jvrst  of  these  heads,  that  of  a  family 
establishing  itself  with  hereditary  powers  on  its  own  autho- 
rity, and  independent  of  the  consent  of  a  nation,  all  men 
will  concur  in  calling  it  despotism  ;  and  it  would  be  trespass- 
ing on  their  understanding  to  attempt  to  prove  it. 

But  the  second  head,  that  of  a  nation  establishing  a  par- 
ticular family  with  hereditary  powers,  does  not  present  itself 
as  despotism  on  the  first  reflection ;  but  if  men  will  permit 
a  second  reflection  to  take  place,  and  carry  that  reflection 
forward  but  one  remove  out  of  their  own  persons  to  that  of 
their  offspring,  they  will  then  see  that  hereditary  succession 
becomes  in  its  consequences  the  same  despotism  to  others, 
which  they  reprobated  for  themselves.  It  operates  to  pre- 
clude the  consent  of  the  succeeding  generation,  and  the 
preclusion  of  consent  is  despotism.  When  the  person  who  at 
any  time  shall  be  in  possession  of  a  government,  or  those 
who  stand  in  succession  to  him,  shall  say  to  a  nation,  I  hold 
this  power  in  "  contempt "  of  you,  it  signifies  not  on  what 
authority  he  pretends  to  say  it.  It  is  no  relief,  but  an  aggra- 
vation to  a  person  in  slavery,  to  reflect  that  he  was  sold  by 


BIGHTS   OF   MAH.  81 

his  parent :  and  as  that  which  heightens  the  criminality  of 
an  act  cannot  be  produced  to  prove  the  legality  of  it,  here- 
ditary succession  cannot  be  established  as  a  legal  thing. 

In  order  to  arrive  at  a  more  perfect  decision  on  this  nead, 
it  will  be  proper  to  consider  the  generation  which  undertakes 
to  establisn  a  family  with  hereditary  powers,  separately  from 
the  generations  which  are  to  follow ;  and  also  to  consider 
the  character  in  which  the  first  generation  acts  with  respect 
to  succeeding  generations. 

The  generation  which  selects  a  person,  and  puts  him  at 
the  head  of  its  government,  either  with  the  title  of  king,  or 
any  other  distinction,  acts  its  own  choice,  be  it  wise  or  fool- 
ish, as  a  free  agent  for  itself.  The  person  so  set  up  is  not 
hereditary,  but  selected  and  appointed ;  and  the  generation 
who  sets  nim  up,  does  not  live  under  an  hereditary  govern- 
ment, but  under  a  government  of  its  own  choice  ana  estab- 
lishment. Were  the  generation  who  sets  him  up,  and  the 
person  so  set  up,  to  five  for  ever,  it  never  could  become 
hereditary  succession  :  hereditary  succession  can  only  follow 
on  death  of  the  first  parties. 

As  therefore  hereditary  succession  is  out  of  the  question 
with  respect  to  the  first  generation,  we  have  now  to  con- 
sider the  character  in  which  that  generation  acts  with  respect 
to  the  commencing  generation,  and  to  all  succeeding  ones. 

It  assumes  a  character,  to  which  it  has  neither  right  nor 
title.  It  changes  itself  from  a  legislator  to  a  testator,  and 
affects  to  make  its  will,  which  is  to  have  operation  after  the 
demise  of  the  makers,  to  bequeath  the  government ;  and  it 
not  only  attempts  to  bequeath,  but  to  establish  on  the  suc- 
ceeding generation  a  new  and  different  form  of  government 
under  which  itself  lived.  Itself,  as  is  before  observed,  lived 
not  under  an  hereditary  government,  but  under  a  govern- 
ment of  its  own  choice  and  establishment ;  and  it  now  at- 
tempts by  virtue  of  a  will  and  testament,  (and  which  it  has 
not  authority  to  make,)  to  take  from  the  commencing  gene- 
ration, and  all  future  ones,  the  rights  and  free  agency  by 
Vhich  itself  acted. 

But  exclusive  of  the  right  which  any  generation  has  to 
act  collectively  as  a  testator,  the  objects  to  which  it  applies 
itself  in  this  case,  are  not  within  the  compass  of  any  law,  or 
of  any  will  or  testament. 

The  rights  of  men  in  society,  are  neither  devisable,  nor 
transferable,  nor  annihilable,  but  are  descendable  only ;  and 
it  is  not  in  the  power  of  any  generation  to  intercept  finally, 


82  EIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

and  cut  off  the  descent.  If  the  present  generation,  or  any 
other,  are  disposed  to  be  slaves,  it  does  not  lessen  the  right 
of  the  succeeding  generation  to  be  free :  wrongs  cannot  have 
a  legal  descent.  When  Mr.  Burke  attempts  to  maintain, 
that  the  English  nation  did,  at  the  revolution  of  1688,  most 
solemnly  renounce  and  abdicate  their  rights  for  themselves, 
and  for  all  their  posterity  for  ever,  he  speaks  a  language 
that  merits  not  reply,  and  which  can  only  excite  contempt 
for  his  prostitute  principles,  or  pity  for  his  ignorance. 

In  whatever  light  hereditary  succession,  as  growing  out 
of  the  will  and  testament  of  some  former  generation,  pre- 
sents itself,  it  is  an  absurdity.  A  cannot  make  a  will  to 
take  from  B  his  property,  and  give  it  to  C;  yet  this  is  the 
manner  in  which  (wnat  is  called)  hereditary  succession  by 
law,  operates.  A  certain  former  generation  made  a  will  to 
take  away  the  rights  of  the  commencing  generation  and  all 
future  ones,  and  convey  those  rights  to  a  third  person,  who 
afterwards  comes  forward,  and  tells  them,  in  Mr.  Burke's 
language,  that  they  have  no  rights,  that  their  rights  are 
already  bequeathed  to  him,  and  that  he  will  govern  in  con- 
tempt of  them.  From  such  principles,  and  such  ignorance, 
good  Lord  deliver  the  world! 

But,  after  all,  what  is  this  metaphor,  called  a  crown,  or 
rather,  what  is  monarchy  ?  Is  it  a  thing,  or  is  it  a  name,  or 
is  it  a  fraud  ?  Is  it  a  "  contrivance  of  human  wisdom,"  or 
human  craft,  to  obtain  money  from  a  nation  under  specious 
pretences  ?  Is  it  a  thing  necessary  to  a  nation  ?  If  it  is,  in 
what  does  that  necessity  consist,  what  service  does  it  per- 
form, what  is  its  business,  and  what  are  its  merits  ?  Doth 
the  virtue  consist  in  the  metaphor,  or  in  the  man  ?  Doth 
the  goldsmith  that  makes  the  crown,  make  the  virtue  also  ? 
Doth  it  operate  like  Fortunatus's  wishing  cap,  or  Harle- 
quin's wooden  sword  ?  Doth  it  make  a  man  a  conjurer  ? 
In  fine,  what  is  it  ?  It  appears  to  be  a  something  going 
much  out  of  fashion,  falling  into  ridicule,  and  rejected  in 
some  countries  both  as  unnecessary  and  expensive.  In 
America  it  is  considered  as  an  absurdity,  and  in  France  it 
has  so  far  declined,  that  the  goodness  of  the  man,  and  the 
respect  for  his  personal  character,  are  the  only  things  that 
preserve  the  appearance  of  its  existence. 

If  government  be  what  Mr.  Burke  describes  it,  "  a  con- 
trivance of  human  wisdom,"  I  might  ask  him,  if  wisdom 
was  at  such  a  low  ebb  in  England,  that  it  was  become 
necessary  to  import  it  from  Holland  and  from  Hanover  \ 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN.  8A 

But  I  will  do  the  country  the  justice  to  say,  that  that  was 
not  the  case ;  and  even  if  it  was,  it  mistook  the  cargo.  The 
wisdom  of  every  country,  when  properly  exerted,  is  suffi- 
cient for  all  its  purposes :  and  tnere  could  exist  no  more 
real  occasion  in  England  to  have  sent  for  a  Dutch  stadtholder, 
or  a  German  elector,  than  there  was  in  America  to  have 
done  a  similar  thing.  If  a  country  does  not  understand  its 
own  affairs,  how  is  a  foreigner  to  understand  them,  who 
knows  neither  its  laws,  its  manners,  nor  its  language  ?  If 
there  existed  a  man  so  transcendantly  wise  above  all  others, 
that  his  wisdom  was  necessary  to  instruct  a  nation,  some 
reason  might  be  offered  for  monarchy ;  but  when  we  cast 
our  eyes  about  a  country,  and  observe  how  every  part  un- 
derstands its  own  affairs ;  and  when  we  look  around  the 
world,  and  see  that  of  all  men  in  it,  the  race  of  kings  are 
the  most  insignificant  in  capacity,  our  reason  cannot  fail  to 
ask  us — What  are  those  men  kept  for  ? 

If  there  is  any  thing  in  monarchy  which  we  people  of 
America  do  not  understand,  I  wish  Mr.  Burke  would  be  so 
kind  as  to  inform  us.  I  see  in  America,  a  government  ex- 
tending over  a  country  ten  times  as  large  as  England,  and 
conducted  with  regularity  for  a  fortieth  part  of  the  expense 
which  government  costs  in  England.  If  I  ask  a  man  in 
America,  if  he  wants  a  king,  he  retorts,  and  asks  me  if  I 
take  him  for  an  idiot.  How  is  it  that  this  difference  hap- 
pens :  are  we  more  or  less  wise  than  others  ?  I  see  in 
America,  the  generality  of  the  people  living  in  a  style  of 
plenty,  unknown  in  monarchical  countries  ;  and  I  see  that 
the  principle  of  its  government,  which  is  that  of  the  equal 
rights  of  man,  is  making  a  rapid  progress  in  the  world. 

If  monarchy  is  a  useless  thing,  why  is  it  kept  up  any 
where  ?  And  if  a  necessary  thing,  how  can  it  be  dispensed 
with  ?  That  civil  government  is  necessary,  all  civilized 
nations  will  agree  in ;  but  civil  government  is  republican 
government.  All  that  part  of  the  government  of  England 
which  begins  with  the  office  of  constable,  and  proceeds 
through  the  department  of  magistrate,  quarter-session,  and 
general  assize,  including  the  trial  by  jury,  is  republican 
government.  Nothing  of  monarchy  appears  in  any  part  of 
it,  except  the  name  which  "William  the  conqueror  imposed 
upon  the  English,  that  of  obliging  them  to  call  him  "  their 
sovereign  lord  the  king." 

It  is  easy  to  conceive,  that  a  band  of  interested  men,  such 
as  placemen,  pensioners,  lords  of  the  bed-chamber,  lords  of 


84  RIGHTS   OF  MAW. 

the  kitchen,  lords  of  the  necessary-house,  and  the  Loid 
knows  what  besides,  can  find  as  many  reasons  for  monarchy 
as  their  salaries,  paid  at  the  expense  of  the  country,  amount 
to  ;  but  if  I  ask  the  farmer,  the  manufacturer,  the  merchant, 
the  tradesman,  and  down  through  all  the  occupations  of  life 
to  the  common  laborer,  what  service  monarchy  is  to  him,  he 
can  give  me  no  answer.  If  I  ask  him  what  monarchy  is,  he 
believes  it  is  something  like  a  sinecure. 

Notwithstanding  the  taxes  of  England  amount  to  almost 
seventeen  millions  a-year,  said  to  be  for  the  expenses  of 
government,  it  is  still  evident  that  the  sense  of  the  nation  is 
left  to  govern  itself,  and  does  govern  itself  by  magistrates  and 
juries,  almost  at  its  own  charge,  on  republican  principles, 
exclusive  of  the  expense  of  taxes.  The  salaries  of  the  judges 
are  almost  the  only  charge  that  is  paid  out  of  the  revenue. 
Considering  that  all  the  internal  government  is  executed  by 
the  people,  the  taxes  of  England  ought  to  be  the  lightest  of 
any  nation  in  Europe  ;  instead  of  which,  they  are  the  con- 
trary. As  this  cannot  be  accounted  for  on  the  score  of  civil 
government,  the  subject  necessarily  extends  itself  to  the 
monarchical  part. 

When  the  people  of  England  sent  for  George  I.  (and  it 
would  puzzle  a  wiser  man  than  Mr.  Burke  to  discover  for 
what  he  could  be  wanted,  or  what  service  he  could  render) 
they  ought  at  least  to  have  conditioned  for  the  abandonment 
of  ilanover.  Besides  the  endless  German  intrigues  that 
must  follow  from  a  German  elector's  being  king  of  England, 
there  is  a  natural  impossibility  of  uniting  in  the  same  person 
the  principles  of  freedom  and  the  principles  of  despotism,  or, 
as  it  is  called  in  England,  arbitrary  power.  A  German 
elector  is,  in  his  electorate,  a  despot :  how  then  should  it  be 
expected  that  he  should  be  attached  to  principles  of  liberty 
in  one  country,  while  his  interest  in  'another  was  to  be  sup- 
ported by  despotism  ?  The  union  cannot  exist ;  and  it  might 
easily  have  been  foreseen,  that  German  electors  would  make 
German  kings,  or-  in  Mr.  Burke's  words,  would  assume 
government  with  "  contempt."  The  English  have  been  in 
the  habit  of  considering  a  king  of  England  only  in  the  cha- 
racter in  which  he  appears  to  them  ;  whereas  the  same  per- 
son, while  the  connexion  lasts,  has  a  home-seat  in  another 
country,  the  interest  of  which  is  at  variance  with  their  own, 
and  the  principles  of  the  government  in  opposition  to  each 
other.  To  such  a  person  England  will  appear  as  a  town- 
and  the  electorate  as  the  estate.  The  English 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN.  §5 

may  wish,  as  I  believe  they  do,  success  to  the  principles  of 
liberty  in  France,  or  in  Germany ;  but  a  German  elector 
trembles  for  the  fate  of  despotism  in  his  electorate  ;  and  the 
duchy  of  Mecklenburg,  where  the  present  queen's  family 
governs,  is  under  the  same  wretched  state  of  arbitrary  power, 
and  the  people  in  slavish  vassalage. 

There  never  was  a  time  when  it  became  the  English  to 
watch  continental  intrigues  more  circumspectly  than  at  the 
present  moment,  and  to  distinguish  the  politics  of  the  electo- 
rate from  the  politics  of  the  nation.  The  revolution  of 
France  has  entirely  changed  the  ground  with  respect  to 
England  and  France,  as  nations  :  but  the  German  despots, 
with  Prussia  at  their  head,  are  combining  against  liberty ; 
and  the  fondness  of  Mr.  Pitt  for  office,  and  the  interest  which 
all  his  family  connexions  have  obtained,  do  not  give  suf- 
ficient security  against  this  intrigue. 

As  everything  which  passes  in  the  world  becomes  matter 
for  history,  I  will  now  quit  this  subject,  and  take  a  concise 
review  of  the  state  of  parties  and  politics  in  England,  as  Mr. 
Burke  has  done  in  France. 

Whether  the  present  reign  commenced  with  contempt,  I 
leave  to  Mr.  Burke :  certain,  however  it  is,  that  it  had 
strongly  that  appearance.  The  animosity  of  the  English 
nation,  it  is  very  well  remembered,  ran  high  :  and,  had  the 
true  principles  of  liberty  been  as  well  understood  then  as 
they  now  promise  to  be,  it  is  probable  the  nation  would  not 
have  patiently  submitted  to  so  much.  George  I.  and  II. 
were  sensible  of  a  rival  in  the  remains  of  the  Stuarts  :  and 
as  they  could  not  but  consider  themselves  as  standing  on 
their  good  behaviour,  they  had  prudence  to  keep  their  Ger- 
man principles  of  government  to  themselves;  but  as  the 
Stuart  family  wore  away,  the  prudence  became  less  neces- 
sary. 

The  contest  between  rights,  and  what  were  called  prero- 
gatives, continued  to  heat  the  nation  till  some  time  after  the 
conclusion  of  the  American  revolution,  when  all  at  once  it 
fell  a  calm ;  execration  exchanged  itself  for  applause,  and 
court  popularity  sprung  up  like  a  mushroom  in  tne  night. 

To  account  for  this  sudden  transition,  it  is  proper  to  ob- 
serve, that  there  are  two  distinct  species  of  popularity  ;  the 
one  excited  by  merit,  the  other  oy  resentment.  As  the 
nation  had  formed  itself  into  two  parties,  and  each  was 
extolling  the  merits  of  its  parliamentary  champions  for  and 
against  the  prerogative,  nothing  could  operate  to  give  a  more 


00  RIGHTS   OF   MAH. 

general  shock  tlan  an  immediate  coalition  of  the  champions 
themselves.  The  partisans  of  each  being  thus  suddenly 
left  in  the  lurch,  and  mutually  heated  with  disgust  at  the 
measure,  felt  no  other  relief  than  in  uniting  in  a  common 
execration  against  both.  A  higher  stimulus  of  resentment 
being  thus  excited  than  what,  the  contest  on  prerogatives 
had  occasioned,  the  nation  quitted  all  former  objects  of 
rights  and  wrongs,  and  sought  only  that  of  gratification. — 
The  indignation  at  the  coalition,  so  efiectually  superseded 
the  indignation  against  tho  court,  as  to  extinguish  it :  and 
without  any  change  of  principles  on  the  part  of  the  court, 
the  same  people  who  had  reprobated  its  despotism,  united 
with  it,  to  revenge  themselves  on  the  coalition  parliament. 
The  case  was  not,  which  they  liked  best — but,  which  they 
hated  most ;  and  the  least  hated  passed  for  love.  The  dis- 
solution of  the  coalition  parliament,  as  it  afforded  the  means 
of  gratifying  the  resentment  of  the  nation,  could  not  fail 
to  be  popular ;  and  from  hence  arose  the  popularity  of  the 
court. 

Transitions  of  this  kind  exhibit  to  us  a  nation  under  the 
government  of  temper,  instead  of  a  fixed  and  steady  prin- 
ciple ;  and  having  once  committed  itself,  however  rashly,  it 
feels  itself  urged  along  to  justify  by  continuance  its  first 
proceeding.  Measures  whicn  at  other  times  it  would  cen- 
sure, it  now  approves,  and  acts  persuasion  upon  itself  to 
suffocate  its  judgment. 

On  the  return  of  a  new  parliament,  the  new  minister,  Mr. 
Pitt,  found  himself  in  a  secure  majority ;  and  the  nation 
gave  him  credit,  not  out  of  regard  to  himself,  but  because 
it  had  resolved  to  do  it  out  of  resentment  to  another.  He 
introduced  himself  to  public  notice  by  a  proposed  reform 
of  parliament,  which  in  its  operation  would  have  amounted 
to  a  public  justification  of  corruption.  The  nation  was  to 
be  at  the  expense  of  buying  up  the  rotten  boroughs,  whereas 
it  ought  to  punish  the  persons  who  deal  in  the  traffic. 

Passing  over  the  two  bubbles,  of  the  Dutch  business,  and 
the  million  a-year  to  sink  the  national  debt,  the  matter 
which  is  most  prominent,  is  the  affair  of  the  regency.  Never 
in  the  course  of  my  observation,  was  delusion  more  success- 
fully acted,  nor  a  nation  more  completely  deceived.  But, 
to  make  this  appear,  it  will  be  necessary  to  go  over  the  cir- 
cumstances. 

Mr.  Fox  had  stated  in  the  house  of  commons,  that  the 
prince  of  "Wales,  as  heir  in  succession,  had  a  right  in  him- 


EIGHTS    OF   MAN.  87 

self  to  assume  the  government.  This  was  opposed  by  Mr. 
Pitt  ;  and,  so  far  as  the  opposition  was  confined  to  the  doc- 
trine, it  was  just.  But  the  principles  which  Mr.  Pitt  main- 
tained on  the  contrary  side,  were  as  bad,  or  worse,  in  their 
extent  than  those  of  Mr.  Fox  ;  because  they  went  to  estab- 
lish an  aristocracy  over  the  nation,  and  over  the  sinal? 
representation  it  has  in  the  house  of  commons. 

Whether  the  English  form  of  government  be  good  or  bad, 
is  not  in  this  case  the  question  ;  but,  taking  it  as  it  stands, 
without  regard  to  its  merits  or  demerits,  Mr.  Pitt  was  further 
from  the  point  than  Mr.  Fox. 

It  is  supposed  to  consist  of  three  parts  ;  while,  therefore, 
the  nation  is  disposed  to  continue  this  form,  the  parts  have 
a  national  standing,  independant  of  each  other,  and  are  not 
the  creatures  of  each  other.  Had  Mr.  Fox  passed  through 
parliament,  and  said,  that  the  person  alluded  to  claimed  on 
the  ground  of  the  nation,  Mr.  Pitt  must  then  have  contended 
for  (what  he  called)  the  right  of  the  parliament,  against  the 
right  of  the  nation. 

JBy  the  appearance  which  the  contest  made,  Mr.  Fox  took 
the  hereditary  ground,  and  Mr.  Pitt  the  parliamentary 
ground  ;  but  the  fact  is,  they  both  took  hereoitary  ground, 
and  Mr.  Pitt  took  the  worst  of  the  two. 

What  is  called  the  parliament,  is  made  up  of  two  houses  ; 
one  of  which  is  more  Hereditary,  and  more  beyond  the  con- 
trol of  the  nation,  than  what  the  crown  (as  it  is  called)  is 
supposed  to  be.  It  is  an  hereditarv  aristocracy,  assuming 
and  asserting  indefeasible,  irrevocable  rights  and  authority, 
wholly  independent  of  the  nation.  Where  then  was  the 
merited  popularity  of  exalting  this  hereditarv  power  over 
another  hereditar  ower  less  indeendent  of  tne  nation  than 


what  itself  assumed  to  be,  and  of  absorbing  the  rights  of 
the  nation  into  a  house  over  which  it  has  neither  election  nor 
control  ? 

The  general  .impulse  of  the  nation  was  right  ;  but  it  acted 
without  reflection.  It  approved  the  opposition  made  to  the 
right  set  up  by  Mr.  Fox,  without  perceiving  that  Mr.  Pitt 
was  supporting  another  indefeasible  right,  more  remote  from 
the  nation  in  opposition  to  it. 

With  respect  to  the  house  of  commons,  it  is  elected  but 
by  a  small  part  of  the  nation  ;  but  were  the  election  as  uni- 
versal as  taxation,  which  it  ought  to  be,  it  would  still  be 
only  the  organ  of  the  nation,  and  cannot  possess  inherent 
rights.  When  the  national  assembly  of  France  resolves  a 


8S  EIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

matter,  the  resolve  is  made  in  right  of  the  nation  ;  but,  Mr. 
Pitt,  on  all  national  questions,  so  far  as  they  refer  to  the 
house  of  commons,  absorbs  the  right  of  the  nation  into  the 
organ,  and  makes  the  organ  into  a  nation,  and  the  nation 
itself  into  a  cipher. 

In  a  few  words,  the  question  on  the  regency  was  a  ques- 
tion on  a  million  a-year,  which  is  appropriated  to  the  execu- 
tive department :  and  Mr.  Pitt  could  not  possess  himself  of 
any  management  of  this  sum,  without  setting  up  the  supre 
macy  of  parliament ;  and  when  this  was  accomplished,  it 
was  indifferent  who  should  be  regent,  as  he  must  be  regent 
at  his  own  cost.  Among  the  curiosities  which  this  conten- 
tious debate  afforded,  was  that  of  making  the  great  seal  into 
a  king ;  the  affixing  of  which  to  an  act,  was  to  be  royal  au- 
thority. If,  therefore,  royal  authority  is  a  great  seal,  it  con- 
sequently is  in  itself  nothing ;  and  a  good  constitution  would 
be  of  infinitely  more  value  to  the  nation,  than  what  the  three 
nominal  powers,  as  they  now  stand  are  worth. 

The  continual  use  of  the  word  constitution  in  the  English 
parliament,  shows  that  there  is  none ;  and  that  the  whole  is 
merely  a  form  of  government  without  a  constitution,  and 
constituting  itself  with  what  powers  it  pleases.  If  there 
was  a  constitution,  it  certainly  would  be  referred  to ;  and  the 
debate  on  any  constitutional  point,  would  terminate  by  pro- 
ducing the  constitution.  One  member  says,  this  is  constitu- 
tional ;  another  says,  that  is  constitutional — To-day  it  is  one 
thing ;  to-morrow  it  is  something  else — while  the  maintain- 
ing the  debate  proves  there  is  none.  Constitution  is  now 
the  cant  word  of  parliament,  turning  itself  to  the  ear  of  the 
nation.  Formerly  it  was  the  universal  supremacy  and  the 
omnipotence  of  parliament.  But  since  the  progress  of  lib- 
erty in  France,  those  phrases  have  a  despotic  harshness  in 
their  note ;  and  the  English  parliament  has  caught  the  fash- 
ion from  the  national  assembly,  but  without  the  substance, 
of  speaking  of  a  constitution. 

As  the  present  generation  of  people  in  England  did  not 
make  the  government,  they  are  not  accountable  for  any  of 
its  defects ;  but  that  sooner  or  later  it  must  come  into  their 
hands  to  undergo  a  constitutional  reformation,  is  as  certain 
as  that  the  same  thing  has  happened  in  France.  If  France, 
with  a  revenue  of  nearly  twenty -four  millions  sterling,  with 
an  extent  of  rich  and  fertile  country  above  four  times  larger 
than  England,  with  a  population  of  twenty-four  millions  of 
Inhabitants  to  support  taxation,  with  upwards  of  ninety  mi)- 


BIGHTS    OF   MAN.  85 

liong  sterling  of  gold  and  silver  circulating  in  the  nation,  and 
with  a  debt  less  than  the  present  debt  of  England — still 
found  it  necessary,  from  whatever  cause,  to  come  to  a  settle- 
ment of  its  affairs,  it  solves  the  problem  of  funding  for  both 
countries. 

It  is  out  of  the  question  to  say  how  long,  what  is  called 
the  English  constitution,  has  lasted,  and  to  argue  from  thence 
lurv  long  it  is  to  last ;  the  question  is  how  long  can  the  fund- 
ing system  last  ?  It  is  a  thing  but  of  modern  invention,  and 
has  not  yet  continued  beyond  the  life  of  a  man  ;  yet,  in  that 
short  space  it  has  so  far  accumulated,  that,  together  with 
the  current  expenses,  it  requires  an  amount  of  taxes  at  least 
equal  to  the  whole  landed  rental  of  the  nation  in  acres,  to 
defray  the  annual  expenditures.  That  a  government  could 
not  always  have  gone  on  by  the  same  system  which  has  been 
followed  for  the  last  seventy  years,  must  be  evident  to 
every  man ;  and  for  the  same  reason  it  cannot  always  go 
on. 

The  funding  system  is  not  money ;  neither  is  it,  properly 
speaking,  credit.  It,  in  effect,  creates  upon  paper  the  sum 
which  it  appears  to  borrow,  and  lays  on  a  tax  to  keep  the 
imaginary  capital  alive  by  the  payment  of  interest,  and 
sends  the  annuity  to  market,  to  be  sold  for  paper  already  in 
circulation.  If  any  credit  is  given,  it  is  to  the  disposition  of 
the  people  to  pay  the  tax,  ana  not  to  the  government  which 
lays  it  on.  When  this  disposition  expires,  what  is  supposed 
to  be  the  credit  of  government  expires  with  it.  The  instance 
of  France,  under  the  former  government,  shows  that  it  is 
impossible  to  compel  the  payment  of  taxes  by  force,  when 
a  whole  nation  is  determined  to  take  its  stand  upon  that 
ground. 

Mr.  Burke,  in  his  review  of  the  finances  of  France,  states 
the  quantity  of  gold  and  silver  in  France,  at  about  eighty- 
eight  millions  sterling.  In  doing  this  he  has,  I  presume, 
divided  by  the  difference  of  exchange,  instead  of  the  stan- 
dard of  twenty-four  livres  to  a  pound  sterling;  for  M. 
Keckar's  statement,  from  which  Mr.  Burke's  is  taken,  is  two 
thousand  two  hundred  millions  of  livres,  which  is  upwards 
of  ninety-one  millions  and  a  half  sterling. 

M.  Neckar,  in  France,  and  Mr.  George  Chalmers  of  the 
office  of  trade  and  plantation  in  England,  of  which  lord 
Hawkesbury  is  president,  published  nearly  about  the  same 
time  (1786)  an  account  of  the  quantity  of  money  in  each 
nation,  from  the  returns  of  the  mint  of  each  nation.  Mr. 


90  EIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

Chalmers,  from  the  returns  of  the  English  mint  at  the  lower 
of  London,  states  the  quantity  of  money  in  England,  in- 
cluding Scotland  and  Ireland,  to  be  twenty  millions  ster- 
ling.* 

M.  Neckarf  says,  that  the  amount  of  money  in  France,  re- 
t.oined  from  the  old  coin  which  was  called  in,  was  two 
thousand  five  hundred  millions  of  livres,  (upwards  of  one 
hundred  and  four  millions  sterling,)  and,  after  deducting  for 
waste,  and  what  may  be  in  the  West-Indies,  and  other  possi- 
ble circumstances,  states  the  circulating  quantity  at  home,  to 
be  ninety-one  millions  and  a  half  sterling ;  but,  taking  it  as 
Mr.  Burke  has  put  it,  it  is  sixty-eight  millions  more  than  the 
national  quantity  in  England. 

That  the  quantity  of  money  in  France  cannot  be  under 
this  sum,  may  at  once  be  seen  from  the  state  of  the  French 
revenue,  without  referring  to  the  records  of  the  French  mint 
for  proofs.  The  revenue  of  France  prior  to  the  revolution, 
was  nearly  twenty-four  millions  sterling ;  and  as  paper  had 
then  110  existence  in  France,  the  whole  revenue  was  col- 
lected upon  gold  and  silver ;  and  it  would  have  been  im- 
possible to  have  collected  such  a  quantity  of  revenue  upon 
a  less  national  quantity  than  M.  Neckar  has  stated.  Before 
the  establishment  of  paper  in  England,  the  revenue  was 
about  a  fourth  part  of  the  national  amount  of  gold  and  sil- 
ver, as  may  be  known  by  referring  to  the  revenue  prior  tc 
king  William,  and  the  quantity  of  money  stated  to  be  in  the 
nation  at  that  time,  which  was  nearly  as  much  as  it  is  now. 

It  can  be  of  no  real  service  to  a  nation,  to  impose  upon  it- 
self, or  to  permit  itself  to  be  imposed  upon  ;  but  the  preju 
dices  of  some,  and  the  imposition  of  others,  have  always  re 
presented  France  as  a  nation  possessing  but  little  money 
whereas  the  quantity  is  not  only  more  than  four  times  wha' 
the  quantity  is  in  England,  but  is  considerably  greater  on  a 
proportion  of  numbers.  To  account  for  this  deficiency  on 
the  part  of  England,  some  reference  should  be  had  to  the 
English  system  of  funding.  It  operates  to  multiply  paper, 
and  to  substitute  it  in  the  room  of  money,  in  various  shapes ; 
and  the  more  paper  is  multiplied,  the  more  opportunities  are 
afforded  to  export  the  specie ;  and  it  admits  of  a  possibility 
(by  extending  it  to  small  notes)  of  increasing  paper,  till 
chere  is  no  money  left. 

*  See  Estimate  of  the  comparative  Strength  of  Great  Britain,  bj  Qe« 
Chalmers. 

f  See  Administration  of  the  Finances  of  T?w*«  »*l  iii.  by  M.  Neck*r. 


EIGHTS   OF  MAN.  91 

I  know  this  is  not  a  pleasant  subject  to  English  readers ; 
but  the  matters  I  am  going  to  mention  are  so  important  in 
themselves,  as  to  require  me  attention  of  men  interested  in 
money  transactions  of  a  public  nature.  There  is  a  cir- 
cumstance stated  by  M.  Neckar,  in  his  treatise  on  the  ad- 
ministration of  the  nuances,  which  has  never  been  attended 
to  in  England,  but  which  forms  the  only  basis  whereon  to 
estimate  the  quantity  of  money  (gold  and  silver)  which 
ought  to  be  in  every  nation  in  Europe,  to  preserve  a  relative 
proportion  with  other  nations. 

Lisbon  and  Cadiz  are  the  two  ports  into  which  (money) 
gold  and  silver  from  South  America  are  imported,  and 
which  afterwards  divides  and  spreads  itself  over  Europe  by 
means  of  commerce,  and  increases  the  quantity  of  money  in 
all  parts  of  Europe.  If,  therefore,  the  amount  of  the  annual 
importation  into  Europe  can  be  known,  and  the  relative 
proportion  of  the  foreign  commerce  of  the  several  nations  by 
which  it  is  distributed  can  be  ascertained,  they  give  a  rule, 
sufficiently  true,  to  ascertain  the  quantity  of  money  which 
ought  to  be  found  in  any  nation  at  any  given  time. 

M.  Neckar  shows  from  the  registers  of  Lisbon  and  Cadiz, 
that  the  importation  of  gold  and  silver  into  Europe,  is  five 
millions  sterling  annually.  He  has  not  taken  it  on  a  single 
year,  but  on  an  average  of  fifteen  succeeding  years,  from 
1763  to  1777,  both  inclusive :  in  which  time,  the  amount 
was  one  thousand  eight  hundred  million  livres,  which  is 
seventy-five  millions  sterling.* 

From  the  commencement  of  the  Hanover  succession  in 
1714,  to  the  time  Mr.  Chalmers  published,  is  seventy-two 
years ;  and  the  quantity  imported  into  Europe,  in  that  time, 
would  be  three  hundrea  and  sixty  millions  sterling. 

If  the  foreign  commerce  of  Great  Britain  be  stated  at  a 
sixth  part  of  what  the  whole  foreign  commerce  of  Europe 
amounts  to  (which  is  probably  an  inferior  estimation  to  what 
the  gentlemen  at  the  exchange  would  allow)  the  proportion 
which  Britain  should  draw  by  commerce,  of  this  sum,  to 
keep  herself  on  a  proportion  with  the  rest  of  Europe,  would 
be  also  a  sixth  part,  which  is  sixty  millions  sterling ;  and  if 
the  same  allowance  for  waste  and  accident  be  made  for 
England,  which  M.  Neckar  makes  for  France,  the  quantity 
remaining  after  these  deductions,  would  be  fifty-two  mil- 
lions, and  this  sum  ought  to  have  been  in  the  nation  (at  the 
time  Mr.  Chalmers  published)  in  addition  to  the  Bum  which 

*  Administration  of  the  Finances  of  Franco,  vol.  iii. 


92  BIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

was  in  the  nation  at  the  commencement  cf  the  Hanover 
succession,  and  to  have  made  in  the  whole  at  least  sixty-six 
millions  sterling ;  instead  of  which  there  were  but  twenty 
millions,  which  is  forty-six  millions  below  its  proportionate 
quantity. 

As  the  quantity  of  gold  and  silver,  imported  into  Lisbon 
and  Cadiz  is  more  easily  ascertained  than  that  of  any  com- 
modity imported  into  England ;  and  as  the  quantity  of  money 
coined  at  the  Tower  of  London,  is  still  more  positively  known, 
the  leading  facts  do  not  admit  of  a  controversy.  Either, 
therefore,  the  commerce  of  England  is  unproductive  of  profit, 
or  the  gold  and  silver  which  it  brings  in,  leak  continually 
away  by  unseen  means,  at  the  average  rate  of  about  three 
quarters  of  a  million  a-year,  which  in  the  course  of  seventy- 
two  years,  accounts  for  the  deficiency;  and  its  absence  is 
supplied  by  paper.* 

*  Whether  the  English  commerce  does  not  bring  in  money,  or  whether  the 
government  sends  it  out  after  it  is  brought  in,  is  a  matter  which  the  parties 
concerned  can  best  explain ;  but  that  the  deficiency  exists,  is  not  in  the  power 
of  either  to  disprove.  While  Dr.  Price,  Mr.  Eden,  (now  Auckland,)  Mr.  Chal- 
mers, and  others,  were  debating  whether  the  quantity  of  money  was  greater 
or  less  than  at  the  revolution,  the  circumstance  was  not  adverted  to,  that 
since  the  revolution,  there  cannot  have  been  less  than  four  hundred  millions 
sterling  imported  into  Europe ;  and  therefore  the  quantity  in  England  ought 
at  least  to  have  been  four  times  greater  than  it  was  at  the  revolution,  to  be  on 
a  proportion  with  Europe.  What  England  is  now  doing  by  paper,  is  what 
she  should  have  been  able  to  do  by  solid  money,  if  gold  and  silver  had  come 
into  the  nation  in  the  proportion  it  ought,  or  had  not  been  sent  out ;  and  she 
is  endeavoring  to  restore  by  paper,  the  balance  she  has  lost  by  money.  It  is 
certain,  that  the  gold  and  silver  which  arrive  annually  in  the  register-ships  to 
Spain  and  Portugal,  do  not  remain  in  those  countries.  Taking  the  value  half 
in  gold  and  half  in  silver,  it  is  about  four  hundred  tons  annually ;  and  from 
the  number  of  ships  and  galleons  employed  in  the  trade  of  bringing  those 
metals  from  South- Am  erica  to  Portugal  and  Spain,  the  quantity  sufficiently 
proves  itself,  without  referring  to  the  registers. 

In  the  situation  England  now  is,  it  is  impossible  she  can  increase  in  money. 
High  taxes  not  only  lessen  the  property  of  the  individuals,  but  they  lessen 
also  the  money  capital  of  the  nation,  by  inducing  smuggling,  which  can  only 
be  carried  on  by  gold  and  silver.  By  the  politics  which  the  British  govern- 
ment have  carried  on  with  the  inland  powers  of  Germany  and  the  continent, 
it  has  made  an  enemy  of  all  the  maritime  powers,  and  is  therefore  obliged  to 
keep  up  a  large  navy ;  but  though  the  navy  is  built  in  England,  the  naval 
stores  must  be  purchased  from  abroad,  and  that  from  countries  where  the 
greatest  part  must  be  paid  for  in  gold  and  silver.  Some  fallacious  rumors 
have  been  set  afloat  in  England  to  induce  a  belief  of  money,  and,  among 
others,  that  of  the  French  refugees  bringing  great  quantities.  The  idea  is 
ridiculous.  The  general  part  of  the  money  in  France  is  silver ;  and  it  would 
take  upwards  of  twenty  of  the  largest  broad  wheel  wagons,  with  ten  horses 
each,  to  remove  one  million  sterling  of  silver.  Is  it  then  to  be  supposed,  that 
a  few  people  fleeing  on  horseback  or  in  post-chaises,  in  a  secret  manner,  and 
having  the  French  custom-house  to  pass,  and  the  sea  to  cross,  could  bring 
even  a  sufficiency  for  their  own  expenses  ? 


EIGHTS   OF   MAH.  93 

The  revolution  of  France  is  attended  with  many  novel 
circumstances,  not  only  in  the  political  sphere,  but  in  the 
circle  of  money  transactions.  Among  others,  it  shows  that 
a  government  may  be  in  a  state  of  insolvency,  and  a  nation 
rich.  So  far  as  the  fact  is  confined  to  the  late  government 
of  France,  it  was  insolvent ;  because  the  nation  would  no 
longer  support  its  extravagance,  and  therefore  it  could  no 
longer  support  itself — but  with  respect  to  the  nation  all  the 
means  existed.  A  government  may  be  said  to  be  insolvent 
every  time  it  -applies  to  a  nation  to  discharge  its  arrears. 
The  insolvency  of  the  late  government  of  France,  and  the 
present  government  of  England,  differed  in  no  other  respect 
than  as  tne  disposition  of  the  people  differ.  The  people  of 
France  refused  their  aid  to  the  old  government,  and  the  peo- 
ple of  England  submit  to  taxation  without  inquiry.  What 
is  called  the  crown  in  England  has  been  insolvent  several 
times ;  the  last  of  which,  publicly  known,  was  in  May  1777, 
when  it  applied  to  the  nation  to  discharge  upwards  of 
600,OOOZ.  private  debts,  which  otherwise  it  could  not  pay. 

It  was  the  error  of  Mr.  Pitt,  Mr.  Burke,  and  all  those  who 
were  unacquainted  with  the  affairs  of  France,  to  confound 
the  French  nation  with  the  French  government.  The 
French  nation,  in  effect,  endeavored  to  render  the  late  gov- 
ernment insolvent,  for  the  purpose  of  taking  government 
into  its  own  hands :  and  it  reserved  its  means  for  the  support 
of  the  new  government.  In  a  country  of  such  vast  extent 
and  population  as  France,  the  natural  means  cannot  be 
wanting;  and  the  political  means  appear  the  instant  the 
nation  is  disposed  to  permit  them.  When  Mr.  Burke,  in  a 
speech  last  winter  in  the  British  parliament,  cast  his  eyes 
aver  the  map  of  Europe,  and  saw  a  chasm  that  once  was 
France,  he  talked  like  a  dreamer  of  dreams.  The  same 
natural  France  existed  as  before,  and  all  the  natural  means 
existed  with  it.  The  only  chasm  was  that  which  the  extinc- 
tion of  despotism  had  left,  and  which  was  to  be  filled  up 
with  a  constitution  more  formidable  in  resources  than  the 
power  which  had  expired. 

When  millions  of  money  are  spoken  of,  it  should  be  recollected,  that  such 
gums  can  only  accumulate  in  a  country  by  slow  degrees,  and  a  long  procession 
of  time.  The  most  frugal  system  that  England  could  now  adopt,  would  not 
recover  in  a  century  the  balance  she  has  lost  in  money  since  the  commencement 
of  the  Hanover  succession.  She  is  seventy  millions  behind  France,  and  she 
must  be,  in  some  considerable  proportion,  behind  every  country  in  Europe,  be- 
cnu!»e  the  returns  of  the  English  mint  do  not  show  an  increase  of  money,  while 
the  registers  of  Lisbon  and  Cadiz  show  ao  Furopean  increase  or  between  three 
and  four  hundred  millions  sterling. 


94  BIGHTS   OF   MAtf. 

Although  the  French  nation  rendered  the  late  government 
insolvent,  it  did  not  permit  the  insolvency  to  act  towards  the 
creditors ;  and  the  creditors,  considering  the  nation  as  the 
real  paymaster,  &nd  the  government  only  as  the  agent, 
rested  themselves  on  the  nation,  in  preference  to  the  govern- 
ment. This  appears  greatly  to  disturb  Mr.  Burke,  as  the 
precedent  is  fatal  to  the  policy  by  which  governments  have 
supposed  themselves  secure.  They  have  contracted  debts, 
with  a  view  of  attaching  what  is  called  the  monied  interest 
of  a  nation  to  their  support;  but  the  example  in  France 
shows,  that  the  permanent  security  of  the  creditor  is  in  the 
nation,  and  not  in  the  government ;  and  that  in  all  possible 
revolutions  that  may  nappen  in  governments,  the  means 
are  always  with  the  nation,  and  the  nation  always  in  exist- 
ence. Mr.  Burke  argues,  that  the  creditors  ought  to  have 
abided  the  fate  of  the  government  which  they  trusted ;  but 
the  national  assembly  considered  them  as  the  creditors  of 
the  nation,  not  of  the  government — of  the  master,  and  not 
of  the  steward. 

Notwithstanding  the  late  government  could  not  discharge 
the  current  expenses,  the  present  government  has  paid  off  a 
great  part  of  the  capital.  This  has  been  accomplished  by 
two  means ;  the  one  by  lessening  the  expenses  of  govern- 
ment, and  the  other  by  the  sale  of  the  monastic  and  ecclesi- 
astical landed  estates.  The  devotees  and  penitent  de- 
bauchees, extortioners  and  misers  of  former  days,  to  ensure 
themselves  a  better  world  than  that  they  were  about  to 
leave,  had  bequeathed  immense  property  in  trust  to  the 
priesthood  for  pious  uses  /  and  the  priesthood  kept  it  for 
themselves.  The  national  assembly  has  ordered  it  to  be  sold 
for  the  good  of  the  whole  nation,  and  the  priesthood  to  V 
decently  provided  for. 

In  consequence  of  the  revolution,  the  annual  interest  ot 
the  debt  of  France  will  be  reduced  at  least  six  millions  ster- 
ling, by  paying  off  upwards  of  one  hundred  millions  of  the 
capital ;  which,  with  lessening  the  former  expenses  of  gov- 
ernment at  least  three  millions,  will  place  France  in  a  situa- 
tion worthy  the  imitation  of  Europe. 

Upon  a  whole  review  of  the  subject,  how  vast  is  the  con- 
trast !  While  Mr.  Burke  has  been  talking  of  a  general  bank- 
ruptcy in  France,  the  national  assembly  have  been  paying 
off  the  capital  of  the  national  debt ;  and  while  taxes  nave 
increased  nearly  a  million  a-year  in  England,  they  have 
lowered  several  millions  a-year  in  France-  Not  a  word  has 


K1UHT8   OF  MAJT.  96 

either  Mr.  Burke  cr  Mr.  Pitt  said  about  French  affairs,  or 
the  state  of  the  French  finances,  in  the  present  session  of 
parliament.  The  subject  begins  to  be  too  well  understood, 
and  imposition  serves  no  longer. 

There  is  a  general  enigma  running  through  the  whole  of 
Mr.  Burke's  book.  He  writes  in  a  rage  against  the  national 
assembly :  but  what  is  he  enraged  about  ?  If  his  assertions 
were  as  true  as  they  are  groundless,  and  if  France,  by  her 
revolution,  had  annihilated  her  power,  and  become  what 
he  calls  a  chasm,  it  might  excite  the  grief  of  a  Frenchman, 
(considering  himself  as  a  national  man,)  and  provoke  his  rage 
against  the  national  assembly  ;  but  wny  should  it  excite  the 
rage  of  Mr.  Burke  ?  Alas  !  It  is  not  the  nation  of  France 
that  Mr.  Burke  means,  but  the  court ;  and  every  court  in 
Europe,  dreading  the  same  fate,  is  in  mourning.  He  writes 
neither  in  the  character  of  a  Frenchman  nor  an  Englishman, 
but  in  the  fawning  character  of  that  creature,  known  in  all 
countries,  as  a  friend  to  none,  a  courtier.  Whether  it  be  the 
court  of  Yersailies,  or  the  court  of  St.  James,  or  of  Carlton- 
house,  or  the  court  in  expectation,  signifies  not;  for  the 
caterpillar  principles  of  all  courts  and  courtiers  are  alike. 
They  form  a  common  policy  throughout  Europe,  detached 

1  /*  j  1  •       *  t          /*   *  T  j  •  T  "I    •!         j  1 


France.  That  which  is  a  blessing  to  nations,  is  bitterness  to 
them  ;  and,  as  their  existence  depends  on  the  duplicity  of  a 
country,  they  tremble  at  the  approach  of  principle,  and 
dread  the  precedent  that  threatens  their  overthrow. 


CONCLUSION. 

Reason  and  ignorance,  the  opposites  of  each  other,  influence 
the  great  bulk  of  mankind.  If  either  of  these  can  be  ren- 
dered sufficiently  extensive  in  a  country,  the  machinery  of 
government  goes  easily  on.  Reason  shows  itself,  and  igno- 
rance submits  to  whatever  is  dictated  tp  it. 

The  two  modes  of  government  which  prevail  in  the  world, 
are,  1st,  government  by  election  and  representation ;  2d, 
government  by  hereditary  succession.  The  former  is  epene- 


96  KIGHT8   OF  MAN. 

rally  known  by  the  name  of  republic ;  the  latter  by  that  of 
monarchy  and  aristocracy. 

Those  two  distinct  and  opposite  forms,  erect  themselves  on 
the  two  distinct  and  opposite  bases  of  reason  and  ignorance. 
As  the  exercise  of  government  requires  talents  and  abilities, 
and  as  talents  and  abilities  cannot  have  hereditary  descent, 
it  is  evident  that  hereditary  succession  requires  a  belief  from 
man,  to  which  his  reason  cannot  subscribe,  and  which  can 
only  be  established  upon  his  ignorance ;  and  the  more  igno- 
rant any  country  is,  the  better  it  is  fitted  for  this  species  of 
government. 

On  the  contrary,  government  in  a  well  constituted  republic, 
requires  no  belie?  from  man  beyond  what  his  reason  autho- 
rizes. He  sees  the  rationale  01  the  whole  system,  its  origin, 
and  its  operation ;  and  as  it  is  best  supported  when  best  un- 
derstood, the  human  faculties  act  with  boldness,  and  acquire, 
under  this  form  of  government,  a  gigantic  manliness. 

As,  therefore,  eacn  of  those  forms  acts  on  a  different  basis, 
the  one  moving  freely  by  the  aid  of  reason,  the  other  by 
ignorance ;  we  have  next  to  consider,  what  it  is  that  gives 
motion  to  that  species  of  government  which  is  called  mixed 
government,  or,  as  it  is  sometimes  ludicrously  styled,  a  gov- 
ernment of  this,  that,  a/nd  father. 

The  moving  power  in  this  species  of  government  is,  of 
necessity,  corruption.  However  imperfect  election  and  re- 
presentation may  be  in  mixed  governments,  they  still  give 
exertion  to  a  greater  portion  of  reason  than  is  convenient  to 
the  hereditary  part ;  and  therefore  it  becomes  necessary  to 
buy  the  reason  up.  A  mixed  government  is  an  imperfect 
every-thing,  cementing  and  soldering  the  discordant  parts 
together,  by  corruption,  to  act  as  a  whole.  Mr.  Burke 
appears  highly  disgusted,  that  France,  since  she  had  resolved 
on  a  revolution,  did  not  adopt  what  he  calls  "  a  British 
constitution ;"  and  the  regret  which  he  expresses  on  this 
occasion,  implies  a  suspicion,  that  the  British  constitution 
needed  something  to  keep  its  defects  in  countenance. 

In  mixed  governments,  there  is  no  responsibility;  the 
parts  cover  each  other  till  responsibility  is  lost ;  and  the 
corruption  which  moves  the  machine,  contrives  at  the  same 
time  its  own  escape.  When  it  is  laid  down  as  a  maxim,  that 
a  Icing  can  do  no  wrong,  it  places  him  in  a  state  of  similar 
security  with  that  of  idiots  and  persons  insane,  and  respon- 
sibility is  out  of  the  question,  with  respect  to  himself.  It 
then  descends  upon  the  minister,  who  shelters  himself  under 


RIGHTS   OF  MAN.  97 

ft  majority  in  parliament,  which,  by  places,  pensions,  and 
corruption,  he  can  always  command ;  and  tnat  majority 
justifies  itself  by  the  same  authority  with  which  it  protects 
the  minister.  In  this  rotatory  motion,  responsibility  is 
thrown  off  from  the  parts,  and  from  the  whole. 

When  there  is  a  part  in  a  government  which  can  do  no 
wrong,  it  implies  that  it  does  nothing;  and  is  only  the 
machine  of  another  power,  by  whose  advice  and  direction  it 
acts.  What  is  supposed  to  be  the  king,  in  mixed  govern- 
ments, is  the  cabinet ;  and  as  the  cabinet  is  always  a  part  of 
the  parliament,  and  the  members  justifying  in  one  charac- 
ter what  they  act  in  another,  a  mixed  government  becomes  a 
continual  enigma  ;  entailing  upon  a  country,  by  the  quantity 
of  corruption  necessary  to  solder  the  parts,  the  expense  of 
supporting  all  the  forms  of  government  at  once,  and  finally 
resolving  itself  into  a  government  by  committee  ;  in  which 
the  advisers,  the  actors,  the  approvers,  the  justifiers,  the 
persons  responsible,  and  the  persons  not  responsible,  are  the 
same  person. 

By  this  pantomimical  contrivance,  and  change  of  scene 
and  character,  the  parts  help  each  other  out  in  matters, 
which,  neither  of  them  singly,  would  presume  to  act.  When 
money  is  to  be  obtained,  the  mass  of  variety  apparently  dis- 
solves, and  a  profusion  of  parliamentary  praises  passes  be- 
tween the  parts.  Each  admires,  with  astonishment,  the 
wisdom,  the  liberality  and  disinterestedness  of  the  other ; 
and  all  of  them  breathe  a  pitying  sigh  at  the  burdens  of  the 
nation. 

But  in  a  well-conditioned  republic,  nothing  of  this  solder- 
ing, praising  and  pitying,  can  take  place ;  the  representation 
being  equal  throughout  the  country,  and  complete  in  itself, 
however  it  may  be  arranged  into  legislative  and  executive, 
they  have  all  one  and  the  same  natural  source.  The  parts 
are  not  foreigners  to  each  other,  like  democracy,  aristocracy, 
and  monarchy.  As  there  are  no  discordant  distinctions, 
there  is  nothing  to  corrupt  by  compromise,  nor  confound  by 
contrivance,  r ublic  measures  appeal  of  themselves  to  the 
understanding  of  the  nation,  and,  resting  on  their  own 
merits,  disown  any  nattering  application  to  vanity.  The 
continual  whine  01  lamenting  the  burden  of  taxes,  however 
successfully  it  may  be  practised  in  mixed  governments,  is 
inconsistent  with  the  sense  and  spirit  of  a  republic.  If  taxes 
are  necessary,  they  are  of  course  advantageous ;  and  if  they 
require  an  apology,  the  apolo^v  itself  implies  an  impeach 


#  EIGHTS   OF   MAU. 

ment.     Why  then  is  man  thus  imposed  upon,  or  why  doer 
he  impose  upon  himself. 

When  men  are  spoken  of  as  kings  and  subjects,  or  when 
government  is  mentioned  under  distinct  or  combined  heads 
of  monarchy,  aristocracy,  and  democracy,  what  is  it  that 
reasoning  man  is  to  understand  by  the  terms  ?  If  there 
really  existed  in  the  world  two  more  distinct  and  separate 
elements  of  human  power,  we  should  then  see  the  several 
origins  to  which  those  terms  would  descriptively  apply  ;  but 
as  there  is  but  one  species  of  man,  there  can  be  but  one 
element  of  human  power,  and  that  element  is  man  himself. 
Monarchy,  aristocracy,  and  democracy  are  but  creatures  of 
imagination;  and  a  thousand  such  maybe  contrived  as  well 
as  three. 


From  the  revolutions  of  America  and  France,  and  the 
symptoms  that  have  appeared  in  other  countries,  it  is  evident 
t'lat  the  opinion  of  the  world  is  changing  with  respect  to 
systems  of  government,  and  that  revolutions  are  not  within 
the  compass  of  political  calculations.  The  progress  of  time 
and  circumstances,  which  men  assign  to  the  accomplishment 
of  great  changes,  is  too  mechanical  to  measure  the  force  of 
the  mind,  and  the  rapidity  of  reflection,  by  which  revolu- 
tions are  generated  ;  all  the  old  governments  have  received 
a  shock  from  those  that  already  appear,  and  which  were  once 
more  improbable,  and  are  a  greater  subject  of  wonder,  than 
a  general  revolution  in  Europe  would  be  now. 

When  we  survey  the  wretched  condition  of  man,  under 
the  monarchical  and  hereditary  systems  of  government, 
dragged  from  his  home  by  one  power,  or  driven  by  another, 
and  impoverished  by  taxes  more  than  by  enemies,  it  becomes 
evident  that  those  systems  are  bad,  and  that  a  general  revo- 
lution in  the  principle  and  construction  of  governments  is 
necessary. 

What  is  government  more  than  the  management  of  the 
affairs  of  a  nation  ?  It  is  not,  and  from  its  nature  cannot  be, 
the  property  of  any  particular  man  or  family,  but  of  the 
whole  community  at  whose  expense  it  is  supported,;  and 
though  by  force  or  contrivance  it  has  been  usurped  into  an 
inheritance,  the  usurpation  cannot  alter  the  right  of  things.. 


BIOHTB   OF   MAS.  99 

Sovereignty,  as  a  matter  of  right,  appertains  to  the  nation 
only,  and  not  to  any  individual ;  ana  a  nation  has  at  all 
times  an  inherent,  indefeasible  right  to  abolish  any  form  of 
government  it  finds  inconvenient,  and  establish  such  as 
accords  with  its  interest,  disposition,  and  happiness.  The 
romantic  and  barbarous  distinctions  of  men  into  kings  and 
subjects,  though  it  may  suit  the  condition  of  courtiers  can- 
not that  of  citizens ;  and  is  exploded  by  the  principle  upon 
which  governments  are  now  founded.  Every  citizen  is  a 
member  of  the  sovereignty,  and  as  such  can  acknowledge  no 

Eersonal  subjection ;  and  his  obedience  can  be  only  to  the 
iws. 

When  men  think  of  what  government  is,  they  must  neces- 
sarily suppose  it  to  possess  a  knowledge  of  all  the  objects 
and  matters  upon  which  its  authority  is  to  be  exercised. 
In  this  view  01  government,  the  republican  system,  as  es- 
tablished by  America  and  France,  operates  to  embrace  the 
whole  of  a  nation  :  and  the  knowledge  necessary  to  the  in- 
terest of  all  the  parts,  is  to  be  found  in  the  centre,  which 
the  parts  by  representation  form :  but  the  old  governments 
are  on  a  construction  that  excludes  knowledge  as  well  as 
happiness ;  government  by  monks,  who  know  nothing  of 
the  world  beyond  the  walls  of  a  convent,  is  as  consistent  ar 
government  by  kings. 

What  were  formerly  called  revolutions,  were  little  more 
than  a  change  of  persons,  or  an  alteration  of  local  circum- 
stances. They  rose  and  fell  like  things  of  course,  and  had 
nothing  in  their  existence  or  their  fate  that  could  influence 
beyond  the  spot  that  produced  them.  But  what  we  now 
see  in  the  world,  from  the  revolutions  of  America  and  France, 
are  a  renovation  of  the  natural  order  of  things,  a  system  of 
principles  as  universal  as  truth  and  the  existence  of  man, 
and  combining  moral  with  political  happiness  and  national 
prosperity. 

"  I.  Men  are  born,  and  always  continue,  free  and  equal, 
in  respect  to  their  rights.  Civil  distinctions,  therefore,  can 
be  founded  only  on  public  utility. 

"  II.  The  end  of  all  political  associations  is  the  preserva- 
tion of  the  natural  and  imprescriptible  rights  of  man,  and 
these  rights  are  liberty,  property,  security,  and  resistance  of 
oppression. 

"  III.  The  nation  is  essentially  the  source  of  all  sovereignty ; 
nor  can  any  individual,  or  any  body  of  men,  be  entitled  to 
.  any  authority  which  is  not  expressly  derived  from  it." 


100  BIGHTS  OF  MAJT. 

In  these  principles  there  is  nothing  to  throw  a  nation  intu 
confusion,  by  inflaming  ambition.  They  are  calculated  to 
call  forth  wisdom  and  abilities,  and  to  exercise  them  for 
the  public  good,  and  not  for  the  emolument  or  aggrandize- 
ment of  particular  descriptions  of  men  or  families.  Mo- 
narchical sovereignty,  the  enemy  of  mankind  and  the  source 
of  misery,  is  abolished ;  and  sovereignty  itself  is  restored  to 
its  natural  and  original  place,  the  nation. — Were  this  the 
case  throughout  Europe,  the  cause  of  wars  would  be  taken 
away. 

It  is  attributed  to  Henry  1Y.  of  France,  a  man  of  an  en 
larged  and  benevolent  heart,  that  he  proposed,  about  the 
year  1620,  a  plan  for  abolishing  war  in  Europe.  The  plan 
consisted  in  constituting  an  European  congress,  or,  as  the 
French  authors  style  it,  a  pacific  republic;  by  appointing 
delegates  from  the  several  nations,  who  were  to  act,  as  a 
court  of  arbitration,  in  any  disputes  that  might  arise  be- 
tween nation  and  nation. 

Had  such  a  plan  been  adopted  at  the  time  it  was  proposed, 
the  taxes  of  England  and  France,  as  two  of  the  parties, 
would  have  been  at  least  ten  millions  sterling  annually,  to 
each  nation,  less  than  they  were  at  the  commencement  of 
the  French  revolution. 

To  conceive  a  cause  why  such  a  plan  has  not  been  adopted, 
(and  that  instead  of  a  congress  for  the  purpose  of  preventing 
war,  it  has  been  called  only  to  terminate  a  war,  after  a 
fruitless  expense  of  several  years,)  it  will  be  necessary  to 
consider  the  interest  of  governments  as  a  distinct  interest  to 
that  of  nations. 

Whatever  is  the  •  cause  of  taxes  to  a  nation,  becomes  also 
the  means  of  revenue  to  a  government.  Every  war  ter- 
minates with  an  addition  of  taxes,  and  consequently  with 
an  addition  of  revenue ;  and  in  any  event  of  war,  in  the 
manner  they  are  now  commenced  and  concluded,  the  power 
and  interest  of  governments  are  increased.  War,  therefore, 
from  its  productiveness,  as  it  easily  furnishes  the  pretence 
of  necessity  for  taxes  and  appointments  to  places  and  offices, 
becomes  the  principal  part  of  the  system  of  old  governments ; 
and  to  establish  any  mode  to  abolish  war,  however  advan- 
tageous it  might  be  to  nations,  would  be  to  take  from  such 
government  the  most  lucrative  of  its  branches.  The  frivo- 
lous matters  upon  which  war  is  made,  show  the  disposition 
and  avidity  of  governments  to  uphold  the  system  of  war, 
and  betray  the  motives  upon  which  they  act. 


RIGHTS   OF   MAS.  10 

Why  are  not  republics  plunged  into  war,  but  because  th« 
nature  of  their  government  does  not  admit  of  an  interest  dis- 
tinct from  that  of  the  nation  ?  Even  Holland,  though  an  ill- 
constructed  republic,  and  with  a  commerce  extending  over 
the  world,  existed  nearly  a  century  without  war :  and  the 
instant  the  form  of  government  was  changed  in  France,  the 
republican  principles  of  peace,  and  domestic  prosperity  and 
economy,  arose  with  the  new  government ;  and  the  same 
consequences  would  follow  the  same  causes  in  other  nations, 

As  war  is  the  system  of  government  on  the  old  construc- 
tion, the  animosity  which  nations  reciprocally  entertain,  is 
nothing  more  than  what  the  policy  of  tneir  governments  ex- 
cite, to  keep  up  the  spirit  of  the  system.  Each  government 
accuses  the  other  of  perfidy,  intrigue  and  ambition,  as  a 
means  of  heating  the  imagination  of  their  respective  nations, 
and  incensing  them  to  hostilities.  Man  is  not  the  enemy  of 
man,  but  through  the  medium  of  a  false  system  of  govern- 
ment. Instead,  therefore,  of  exclaiming  against  the  ambi- 
tion of  kings,  the  exclamation  should  be  directed  against  the 
principle  of  such  governments ;  and  instead  of  seeking  to 
reform  the  individual,  the  wisdom  of  a  nation  should  apply 
itself  to  reform  the  system. 

Whether  the  forms  and  maxims  of  governments  which  are 
still  in  practice,  were  adapted  to  the  condition  of  the  world 
at  the  period  they  were  established,  is  not  in  this  case  the 
question.  The  older  they  are  the  less  correspondence  can 
tney  have  with  the  present  state  of  things.  Time,  and 
change  of  circumstances  and  opinions  have  the  same  pro- 
gressive effect  in  rendering  modes  of  government  obsolete,  aa 
tney  have  upon  customs  and  manners.  Agriculture,  com- 
merce, manufactures,  and  the  tranquil  arts,  by  which  the 
prosperity  of  nations  is  best  promoted,  require  a  different 
.  system  of  government  and  a  different  species  of  knowledge 
to  direct  its  operations,  to  what  might  have  been  the  former 
condition  of  the  world. 

As  it  is  not  difficult  to  perceive,  from  the  enlightened 
state  of  mankind,  that  the  hereditary  governments  are  verg- 
ing1 to  their  decline,  and  that  revolutions  on  the  broad  basis 
of  national  sovereignty,  and  government  by  representation, 
are  making  their  way  in  Europe,  it  would  be  an  act  of  wis- 
dom to  anticipate  their  approach,  and  produce  revolutions 
by  reason  and  accommodation,  rather  than  commit  them 
to  the  issue  of  convulsions. 

From  what  we  now  see,  nothing  of  reform  in  the  political 


102  BIGHlfi   OF   MAN. 

world  ought  to  be  held  improbable.  It  is  an  age  of  revolu. 
tions,  in  which  every  thing  may  be  looked  for.  The  intrigue 
of  courts,  by  which  the  system  of  war  is  kept  up,  may  pro- 
voke a  confederation  of  nations  to  abolish  it :  and  an  Euro- 
pean congress  to  patronize  the  progress  of  free  government, 
and  promote  the  civilization  of  nations  with  each  other  is  an 
event  nearer  in  probability,  than  once  were  the  revolution*} 
and  alliances  of  France  and  America. 


RIGHTS  OF  MAN. 

PART     II. 
COMBINING  PRINCIPLES  AND  PRACTI01. 


TO  M.  DE  LA  FA  FETTE. 

AFTEK  an  acquaintance  of  nearly  fifteen  years,  in  difficult 
situations  in  America,  and  various  consultations  in  Europe, 
I  feel  a  pleasure  in  presenting  you  this  email  treatise,  in 
gratitude  for  your  services  to  my  beloved  America,  and  as 
a  testimony  of  my  esteem  for  the  virtues,  public  and  private, 
which  I  know  you  to  possess. 

The  only  point  upon  which  I  could  ever  discover  that  we 
differed,  was  not  as  to  principles  of  government,  but  as 
to  time.  For  my  own  part,  1  think  it  equally  as  injurious 
to  good  principles  to  permit  them  to  linger,  as  to  push  them 
on  too  last.  That  which  you  suppose  accomplishable  in 
fourteen  or  fifteen  years,  I  may  believe  practicable  in  a 
much  shorter  period.  Mankind,  as  it  appears  to  me,  are 
always  ripe  enough  to  understand  their  true  interest,  pro- 
vided it  be  presented  clearly  to  their  understanding,  and 
that  in  a  manner  not  to  create  suspicion  by  any  thing  like 
sell-design,  nor  to  offend  by  assuming  too  much.  Where  we 
would  wish  to  reform  we  must  not  reproach. 

When  the  American  revolution  was  established,  1  felt  a 
disposition  to  sit  serenely  down  and  enjoy  the  calm.  It  did 
not  appear  to  r\e  that  any  object  could  afterwards  arise 
great  enough  to  make  me  quit  tranquillity,  and  feel  as  I  had 
felt  before.  But  when  principle,  and  not  place,  is  the  ener- 
getic cause  of  action,  a  man,  I  find,  is  every  where  the 
same. 

I  am  now  once  more  in  the  public  world ;  and  as  I  have 
not  a  right  to  contemplate  on  so  many  years  of  remaining 
life  as  you  have,  I  am  resolved  to  labour  as  fast  as  I  can ;  and 
as  I  am  anxious  for  your  aid  and  your  company,  I  wish  you 
to  hasten  your  principles  and  overtake  me. 

If  you  make  a  campaign  the  ensuing  spring,  which  it  is 
most  probable  there  will  be  no  occasion  for,  I  will  come  and 
join  you.  Should  the  campaign  commence,  I  hope  it  will 
terminate  in  the  extinction  01  German  despotism,  and  in 
establishing  the  freedom  of  all  Germany.  When  France 
shall  be  surrounded  with  revolutions,  she  will  be  in  peace 
and  safety,  and  her  taxes,  as  well  as  those  of  Germany,  will 
consequently  become  less. 

Your  sincere, 

Affectionate  friend, 

THOMAS  PAINE. 

£Wo»,  February  9,  1798. 


PREFACE. 


WHEN  I  began  the  chapter  entitled  the  Conclusion^  in  the 
former  part  of  the  Rights  of  Man,  published  last  year,  it 
was  my  intention  to  have  extended  it  to  a  greater  length ; 
but  in  casting  the  whole  matter  in  my  mind  which  I  wished 
to  add,  I  found  that  I  must  either  mate  the  work  too  bulky. 
or  contract  my  ^la-n  too  much.  I  therefore  brought  it  to  a 
close  as  soon  as  the  subject  would  admit,  and  reserved  what 
I  had  further  to  say  to  another  opportunity. 

Sever?1  other  reasons  contributed  to  produce  this  deter- 
mination, i  wished  to  know  the  manner  in  which  a  work, 
written  in  a  stjle  of  thinking  and  expression  at  variance 
with  what  had  been  customary  in  England,  would  be  re- 
ceived, before  I  proceeded  further.  A  great  field  was 
opening  to  the  view  of  mankind  by  means  of  the  French 
revolution.  Mr.  Burke's  outrageous  opposition  thereto 
brought  the  controversy  into  England.  He  attacked  prin- 
ciples which  he  knew  (from  information)  I  would  contest 
with  him,  because  they  are  principles  I  believe  to  be  good, 
and  which  I  have  contributed  to  establish,  and  conceive 
myself  bound  to  defend.  Had  he  not  urged  the  controversy, 
I  had  most  probably  been  a  silent  man. 

Another  reason  for  deferring  the  remainder  of  the  work 
was,  that  Mr.  Burke  promised  in  his  first  publication  to 
renew  the  subject  at  another  opportunity,  and  to  make  a 
comparison  of  what  he  called  the  English  and  French  con- 
stitutions. I  therefore  held  myself  in  reserve  for  him.  He 
has  published  two  works  since,  without  doing  this ;  which 
lie  certainly  would  not  have  omitted,  had  the  comparison 
been  in  his  favour. 

In  his  last  work,  his  "  Appeal  from  the  New  to  the  Old 
Whigs,"  he  has  quoted  about  ten  pages  from  the  Eights  of 

104 


PREFACE.  105 

Man,  and  having  given  himself  the  trouble  of  doing  this, 
says,  "  he  shall  not  attempt  in  the  smallest  degree  to  refute 
them,"  meaning  the  principles  therein  contained.  I  am 
enough  acquainted  with  Mr.  Burke,  to  know,  that  he  would 
if  he  coula.  But  instead  of  contesting  them,  he  immedi- 
ately after  consoles  himself  with  saying  that  "  he  has  done 
his  part." — He  has  not  done  his  part.  He  has  not  per- 
formed his  promise  of  a  comparison  of  constitutions.  He 
started  a  controversy,  he  gave  the  challenge,  and  has  fled 
from  it ;  and  he  is  now  a  case  in  point  witn  his  own  opin- 
ion, that  "  the  age  of  chivalry  is  gone  /" 

The  title,  as  well  as  the  substance  of  his  last  work,  his 
Appeal,  is  his  condemnation.  Principles  must  rest  on  their 
own  merits,  and  if  they  are  good,  they  certainly  will.  To 
put  them  under  the  shelter  of  other  men's  authority,  as  Mr. 
Burke  has  done,  serves  to  bring  them  into  suspicion.  Mr. 
Burke  is  not  very  fond  of  dividing  his  honors,  but  in  this  he 
is  artfully  dividing  the  disgrace. 

But  wno  are  those  to  whom  Mr.  Burke  has  appealed  ?  A 
set  of  childish  thinkers  and  half-way  politicians  born  in  the 
last  century  ;  men  who  went  no  further  with  any  principle 
than  as  it  suited  their  purpose  as  a  party  ;  the  nation  sees 
nothing  in  such  works,  or  such  politics,  worthy  its  attention. 
A  little  matter  will  move  a  party,  but  it  must  be  something 
great  that  moves  a  nation. 

Though  I  see  nothing  in  Mr.  Burke's  Appeal  worth  tak- 
ing notice  of,  there  is,  however,  one  expression  upon  which 
I  shall  offer  a  few  remarks. — After  quoting  largely  from  the 
Rights  of  Man,  and  declining  to  contest  tne  principles  con- 
tained in  that  work,  he  says,  "  This  will  most  probably  be 
done  (if  such  writings  shall  be  thought  to  deserve  any  other 
refutation  than  that  of  criminal  justice)  by  others,  who  may 
think  with  Mr.  Burke  and  with  the  same  zeal." 

In  the  first  place,  it  has  not  been  done  by  anybody.  Not 
less,  I  believe,  than  eight  or  ten  pamphletSj  intended  as 
answers  to  the  former  part  of  the  Rights  of  Man  have  been 
published  by  different  persons,  and  not  one  of  them,  to  my 
knowledge,  has  extended  to  a  second  edition,  nor  are  even 
the  titles  of  them  so  much  as  generally  remembered.  As  I 
am  averse  to  unnecessarily  multiplying  publications,  I  have 
answered  none  of  them.  And  as  Ibeiieve  that  a  man  may 
write  himself  out  of  reputation  when  nobody  else  can  do  it, 
I  am  careful  to  avoid  that  rock. 

But  as  I  decline  unnecessary  publications  on  the  one  hand, 


106  PKEFACE 

so  would  I  avoid  anything  that  looked  like  sullen  pride  on 
the  other.  If  Mr.  Burke,  or  any  person  on  his  side  the 
question,  will  produce  an  answer  to  the  Rights  of  Man,  that 
shall  extend  to  an  half,  or  even  a  fourth  part  of  the  number 
of  copies  to  which  the  Rights  of  Man  extended,  I  will  reply 
to  his  work.  But,  until  this  be  done,  I  shall  so  far  take  the 
sense  of  the  public  for  my  guide  (and  the  world  knows  I  am 
not  a  flatterer)  that  what  they  do  not  think  worth  while  to 
read,  is  not  worth  mine  to  answer.  I  suppose  the  number 
of  copies  to  which  the  first  part  of  the  Rights  of  Man  ex- 
tended, taking  England,  Scotland,  and  Ireland,  is  not  less 
than  between  forty  and  fifty  thousand. 

I  now  come  to  remark  on  the  remaining  part  of  the  quo- 
tation I  have  made  from  Mr.  Burke. 

"  If,"  says  he,  "  such  writings  shall  be  thought  to  deserve 
any  other  refutation  than  that  of  criminal  justice." 

Pardoning  the  pun,  it  must  be  criminal  justice  indeed 
that  should  condemn  a  work  as  a  substitute  for  not  being 
able  to  refute  it.  The  greatest  condemnation  that  could  be 
passed  upon  it  would  be  a  refutation.  But,  in  proceeding 
by  the  method  Mr.  Burke  alludes  to,  the  condemnation 
would  in  the  final  event,  pass  upon  the  criminality  of  the 
process  and  not  upon  the  work,  and  in  this  case,  I  had  rather 
oe  the  author,  than  be  either  the  judge  or  the  jury  that 
should  condemn  it. 

But  to  come  at  once  to  the  point.  I  have  differed  frosn 
Borne  professional  gentlemen  on  the  subject  of  prosecutions, 
and  I  since  find  they  are  falling  into  my  opinion,  which  I 
shall  here  state  as  fully,  but  as  concisely  as  I  can. 

I  will  first  put  a  case  with  respect  to  any  law,  and  then 
compare  it  with  a  government,  or  with  what  in  England  is, 
or  has  been  called  a  constitution. 

It  would  be  an  act  of  despotism,  or  what  in  England  is 
called  arbitrary  power,  to  make  a  law  to  prohibit  investigat- 
ing the  principles,  good  or  bad,  on  which  such  a  law,  or  any 
other  is  founded. 

If  a  law  be  bad,  it  is  one  thing  to  oppose  the  practice  of  it, 
but  it  is  quite  a  different  thing  to  expose  its  errors,  to  reason 
on  its  defects,  and  to  show  cause  why  it  should  be  repealed, 
or  why  another  ought  to  be  substituted  in  its  place.  I  have 
always  held  it  an  opinion  (making  it  also  my  practice)  that 
it  is  better  to  obey  a  bad  law,  making  use  at  the  same  time 
of  every  argument  to  show  its  errors,  and  procure  its  repeal, 
than  forcibly  to  violate  it ;  because  the  precedent  of  break- 


1'KEFACE.  107 

Ing  a  bad  law  might  weaken  the  force,  and  lead  to  a  discre- 
tionary violation  of  those  which  are  good. 

The  case  is  the  same  with  respect  to  principles  and  forms 
of  government,  or  to  what  are  called  constitutions,  and  the 
parts  of  which  they  are  composed. 

It  is  for  the  good  of  nations,  and  not  for  the  emolument 
or  aggrandizement  of  particular  individuals,  that  govern- 
ment ought  to  be  established,  and  that  mankind  are  at  the 
expense  of  supporting  it.  The  defects  of  every  government 
and  constitution  both  as  to  principle  and  form,  must,  on  a 
parity  of  reasoning,  be  as  open  to  discussion  as  the  defects 
of  a  law,  and  it  is  a  duty  which  every  man  owes  to  society 
to  point  them  out.  When  those  defects  and  the  means  of 
remedying  them,  are  generally  seen  by  a  nation,  that  nation 
will  reform  its  government  or  its  constitution  in  the  one  case, 
as  the  government  repealed  or  reformed  the  law  in  the  other. 
The  operation  of  government  is  restricted  to  the  making  and 
the  administering  of  laws ;  but  it  is  to  a  nation  that  the  right 
of  forming  or  reforming,  generating  or  regenerating  consti- 
tutions and  governments  belong ;  and  consequently  those 
subjects,  as  subjects  of  investigation,  are  always  before  a 
country  as  a  matter  of  right,  and  cannot,  without  invading 
the  general  rights  of  that  country,  be  made  subjects  for 
prosecution.  On  this  ground  I  will  meet  Mr.  Burke  when- 
ever he  pleases.  It  is  better  that  the  whole  argument  should 
come  out,  than  to  seek  to  stifle  it.  It  was  himself  that 
opened  the  controversy,  and  he  ought  not  to  desert  it. 

I  do  not  believe  that  monarchy  and  aristocracy  will  con- 
tinue seven  years  longer  in  any  of  the  enlightened  countries 
of  Europe.  If  better  reasons  can  be  shown  for  them  than 
against  them,  they  will  stand ;  if  the  contrary,  they  will  not. 
Mankind  are  not  now  to  be  told  they  shall  not  think,  or  they 
shall  not  read :  and  publications  that  go  no  further  than  to 
investigate  principles  of  government,  to  invite  men  to  reason 
and  to  reflect,  and  to  show  the  errors  and  excellencies  of  differ- 
ent systems,  have  a  right  to  appear.  If  they  do  not  excite 
attention,  they  are  not  worth  the  trouble  of  a  prosecution ; 
and  if  they  do,  the  prosecution  will  amount  to  nothing,  since 
it  cannot  amount  to  a  prohibition  of  reading.  This  would 
be  a  sentence  on  the  public,  instead  of  the  autnor,  and  would 
also  be  the  most  effectual  mode  of  making  or  hastening 
revolutions. 

On  all  cases  that  apply  universally  to  a  nation,  with  res- 
pect to  systems  of  government,  a  jury  of  twelve  men  is  not 


108  PBEFACE. 

competent  to  decide.  Where  there  are  no  witnesses  to  be 
examined,  no  facts  to  be  proved,  and  where  the  whole  mat- 
ter is  before  the  whole  public,  and  the  merits  or  demerits  of 
it  resting  on  their  opinion ;  and  where  there  is  nothing  to  be 
known  in  a  court,  but  what  every  body  knows  out  of  it, 
every  twelve  men  are  equally  as  good  a  jury  as  the  other, 
and  would  most  probably  reverse  each  other's  verdict ;  or, 
from  the  variety  of  their  opinions,  not  be  able  to  form  one. 
It  is  one  case  whether  a  nation  approve  a  work,  or  a  plan ; 
but  it  is  quite  another  case  whether  it  will  commit  to  any 
such  jury  the  power  of  determining  whether  that  nation  has 
a  right  to,  or  shall  reform  its  government,  or  not.  I  men- 
tion these  cases,  that  Mr.  Burke  may  see  I  have  not  written 
on  government  without  reflecting  on  what  is  law,  as  well  as 
on  what  are  rights. — The  only  effectual  jury  in  such  cases 
would  be  a  convention  of  the  whole  nation  fairly  elected ; 
for,  in  all  such  cases,  the  whole  nation  is  the  vicinage. 

As  to  the  prejudices  which  men  have  from  education  and 
habit,  in  favour  of  any  particular  form  or  system  of  govern- 
ment, those  prejudices  have  yet  to  stand  the  test  of  reason 
and  reflection.  In  fact  such  prejudices  are  nothing.  No 
man  is  prejudiced  in  favour  of  a  thing  knowing  it  to  be 
wrong.  He  is  attached  to  it  on  the  belief  of  its  being  right  j 
and  when  he  sees  it  is  not  so,  the  prejudice  will  be  gone. 
"We  have  but  a  defective  idea  of  what  prejudice  is.  It  might 
be  said  that  until  men  think  for  themselves  the  whole  is  pre- 
judice and  not  opinion  •  for  that  only  is  opinion  which  is  the 
result  of  reason  and  reflection.  I  offer  this  remark,  that  Mr. 
Burke  may  not  confide  too  much  in  what  has  been  the  cus- 
tomary prejudices  of  the  country. 

But  admitting  governments  to  be  changed  all  over  Europe, 
it  certainly  may  be  done  without  convulsion  or  revenge.  It 
is  not  worth  making  changes  or  revolutions,  unless  it  be  foi 
some  great  national  benefit,  and  when  this  shall  appear  to 
a  nation,  the  danger  will  be,  as  in  America  and  France, 
to  those  who  oppose ;  and  with  this  reflection  I  close  my 
preface. 

THOMAS  PAINE. 

London,  Feb.  9, 1792. 


KIGHTS    OF   MAN 


PART  II. 

INTRODUCTION. 

WHAT  Archimedes  said  of  the  mechanical  powers,  may  be 
applied  to  reason  and  liberty :  "  Had  we"  said  he,  "  a  place 
to  stand  upon,  we  might  raise  the  world" 

The  revolution  in  America  presented  in  politics  what  was 
only  theory  in  mechanics.  So  deeply  rooted  were  all  the 
governments  of  the  old  world,  and  so  effectually  had  the 
tyranny  and  the  antiquity  of  habit  established  itself  over  the 
mind,  that  no  beginning  could  be  made  in  Asia,  Africa  01 
Europe,  to  reform  the  political  condition  of  man.  Freedom 
had  been  hunted  round  the  globe :  reason  was  considered 
as  rebellion ;  and  the  slavery  of  fear  had  made  men  afraid 
to  think. 

But  such  is  the  irresistible  nature  of  truth,  that  all  it  asks, 
and  all  it  wants,  is  the  liberty  of  appearing.  The  sun  needs 
no  inscription  to  distinguish  him  from  darkness,  and  no 
sooner  did  the  American  governments  display  themselves  to 
the  world,  than  despotism  felt  a  shock,  and  man  began  to 
contemplate  redress. 

The  independence  of  America,  considered  merely  as  a 
separation  from  England,  would  have  been  a  matter  but  of 
little  importance,  had  it  not  been  accompanied  by  a  revolu- 
tion in  the  principles  and  practice  of  government.  She 
made  a  stand,  not  for  herself  only,  but  for  the  worlcl,  and 
looked  beyond  the  advantages  which  she  could  receive. 
Even  the  Hessian,  though  hired  to  fight  against  her,  may 
live  to  bless  his  defeat ;  and  England,  condemning  the 
viciousness  of  its  government,  rejoice  in  its  miscarriage. 


110  EIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

As  America  was  the  only  spot  in  the  political  world  where 
the  principles  of  universal  reformation  could  begin,  so  also 
was  it  the  best  in  the  natural  world.  An  assemblage  of  cir- 
cumstances conspired,  not  only  to  give  birth,  but  to  add 
gigantic  maturity  to  its  principles.  The  scene  which  that 
country  presents  to  the  eye  of  the  spectator,  has  something 
in  it  which  generates  and  enlarges  great  ideas.  Nature 
appears  to  him  in  magnitude.  The  mighty  objects  he  be- 
holds, act  upon  his  mind  by  enlarging  it,  and  he  partakes  of 
the  greatness  he  contemplates.  Its  first  settlers  were  emi- 
grants from  different  European  nations,  and  of  diversified 
professions  of  religion,  retiring  from  the  governmental  per- 
secutions of  the  old  world,  and  meeting  in  the  new,  not  as 
enemies,  but  as  brothers.  The  wants  which  necessarily 
accompany  the  cultivation  of  a  wilderness,  produced  among 
them  a  state  of  society,  which  countries  long  harassed  by  the 
quarrels  and  intrigues  of  governments,  had  neglected  to 
cherish.  In  such  a  situation  man  becomes  what  he  ought  to 
be.  He  sees  his  species,  not  with  the  inhuman  idea  of  a 
natural  enemy,  but  as  kindred ;  and  the  example  shows  to 
the  artificial  world,  that  man  must  go  back  to  nature  for 
information. 

From  the  rapid  progress  which  America  makes  in  every 
species  of  improvement,  it  is  rational  to  conclude  that  if  the 
governments  of  Asia,  Africa  and  Europe,  had  begun  on  a 
principle  similar  to  that  of  America,  or  had  they  not  been 
very  early  corrupted  therefrom,  those  countries  must  by  this 
time  have  been  in  a  far  superior  condition  to  what  they  are. 
Age  after  age  has  passed  away,  for  no  other  purpose  than  to 
benold  their  wretchedness.  Could  we  suppose  a  spectator 
who  knew  nothing  of  the  world,  and  who  was  put  into  it 
merely  to  make  his  observations,  he  would  take  a  great  part 
of  the  old  world  to  be  new,  just  struggling  with  the  diffi- 
culties and  hardships  of  an  infant  settlement.  He  could  not 
suppose  that  the  hordes  of  miserable  poor,  with  which  old 
countries  abound,  could  be  any  other  than  those  who  had 
not  yet  been  able  to  provide  for  themselves.  Little  would 
he  think  they  were  the  consequence  of  what  in  such  coun- 
tries is  called  government. 

If,  from  the  more  wretched  parts  of  the  old  world,  WQ 
look  at  those  which  are  in  an  advanced  state  of  improve- 
ment, we  still  find  the  greedy  hand  of  government  thrusting 
itself  into  every  corner  and  crevice  of  industry,  and  grasp- 
ing the  spoil  of  the  multitude.  Invention  is  continually 


BIGHTS   OF   MAJI.  Ill 

exercised,  to  furnish  new  pretences  for  revenue  and  taxation. 
It  watches  prosperity  as  its  prey,  and  permits  none  to  escape 
without  a  tribute. 

As  revolutions  have  begun,  (and  as  the  probability  ia 
always  greater  against  a  thing  beginning,  than  of  proceed- 
ing after  it  has  begun)  it  is  natural  to  expect  that  other 
revolutions  will  follow.  The  amazing  and  still  increasing 
expenses  with  which  old  governments  are  conducted,  the 
numerous  wars  they  engage  in  or  provoke,  the  embarrass- 
ments they  throw  in  the  way  of  universal  civilization  and 
commerce,  and  the  oppression  and  usurpation  acted  at  home, 
have  wearied  out  the  patience,  and  exhausted  the  property 
of  the  world.  In  such  a  situation,  and  with  such  examples 
already  existing,  revolutions  are  to  be  looked  for.  They  are 
become  subjects  of  universal  conversation,  and  may  be  con- 
sidered as  the  order  of  the  day. 

If  systems  of  government  can  be  introduced  less  expensive, 
and  more  productive  of  general  happiness,  than  those  which 
have  existed,  all  attempts  to  oppose  their  progress  will  in 
the  end  prove  fruitless.  Reason,  like  time,  will  make  its 
own  way,  and  prej  udice  will  fall  in  the  combat  with  interest. 
If  universal  peace,  harmony,  civilization  and  commerce  are 
<ver  to  be  the  happy  lot  of  man,  it  cannot  be  accomplished 
but  bv  a  revolution  in  the  present  system  of  governments. 
All  the  monarchical  governments  are  military.  War  is 
their  trade,  plunder  and  revenue  their  objects.  While  such 
governments  continue,  peace  has  not  the  absolute  security  of 
a  day.  What  is  the  history  of  all  monarchical  governments 
but  a  disgustful  picture  of  human  wretchedness,  and  the  ac- 
cidental respite  of  a  few  years'  repose  ?  Wearied  with  war, 
and  tired  with  human  butchery,  they  sat  down  to  rest  and 
called  it  peace.  This  certainly  is  not  the  condition  that 
heaven  intended  for  man ;  and  if  this  be  monarchy,  well 
might  monarchy  be  reckoned  among  the  sins  of  the  Jews. 

The  revolutions  which  formerly  took  place  in  the  world, 
had  nothing  in  them  that  interested  the  bulk  of  mankind. 
They  extended  only  to  a  change  of  persons  and  measures, 
but  not  of  principles,  and  rose  or  fell  among  the  common 
transactions  of  the  moment.  What  we  now  behold,  may  not 
impioperly  be  called  a  "  counter  revolution"  Conquest  and 
tyranny,  at  some  early  period,  dispossessed  man  of  his  rights, 
and  he  is  now  recovering  them.  And  as  the  tide  of  human 
affairs  has  its  ebb  and  flow  in  directions  contrary  to  each 
other,  so  also  is  it  in  this.  Government  founded  on  a  moral 


112  BIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

theory,  on  a  system  of  universal  peace,  on  the  indefeasible^ 
hereditary  rights  of  man,  is  now  revolving  from  west  to  east 
by  a  stronger  impulse  than  the  government  of  the  sword  re- 
volved from  east  to  west.  It  interests  not  particular  indi- 
viduals but  nations  in  its  progress,  and  promises  a  new  era 
to  the  human  race. 

The  danger  to  which  the  success  of  revolutions  is  most 
exposed,  is  that  of  attempting  them  before  the  principles  on 
which  they  proceed,  and  the  advantages  to  result  from  them, 
are  sufficiently  understood.  Almost  every  thing  appertain- 
ing to  the  circumstances  of  a  nation  has  been  absorbed  and 
confounded  under  the  general  and  mysterious  word  govern- 
ment. Though  it  avoids  taking  to  its  account  the  errors 
it  commits,  and  the  mischiefs  it  occasions,  it  fails  not  to 
arrogate  to  itself  whatever  has  the  appearance  of  prosperity. 
It  robs  industry  of  its  honors,  by  pedantically  making 
itself  the  cause  of  its  effects ;  and  purloins  from  the  general 
character  of  man,  the  merits  that  appertain  to  him  as  a 
social  being. 

It  may  therefore  be  of  use  in  this  day  of  revolutions,  to 
discriminate  between  those  things  which  are  the  effect  of 

government,  and  those  which  are  not.  This  will  best  be 
one  by  taking  a  review  of  society  and. civilization,  and  the 
consequences  resulting  therefrom,  as  things  distinct  from 
what  are  called  governments.  By  beginning  with  this  inves- 
tigation, we  shall  be  able  to  assign  effects  to  their  proper 
causes,  and  analyze  the  mass  of  common  errors. 


CHAPTEE  I. 

OP  SOCIETY  AND  CIVILIZATION. 

A  GEEAT  part  of  that  order  which  reigns  among  mankind 
is  not  the  effect  of  government.  It  had  its  origin  in  the 
principles  of  society,  and  the  natural  constitution  of  man. 
It  existed  prior  to  government,  and  would  exist  if  the  for- 
mality of  government  was  abolished.  The  mutual  depend- 
ence and  reciprocal  interest  which  man  has  in  man,  and  all 
the  parts  of  a  civilized  community  upon  each  other,  create 
that  great  chain  of  connexion  which  holds  it  together.  Tha 


EIGHTS   OF   MAN  113 

landholder,  the  fanner,  the  manufacturer,  the  merchant,  the 
tradesman,  and  every  occupation  prospers  by  the  aid  which 
each  receives  from  the  otner,  ana  from  the  whole.  Com- 
mon interest  regulates  their  concerns,  and  forms  their  laws ; 
amd  the  laws  which  common  usage  ordains,  have  a  greater 
influence  than  the  laws  of  government.  In  fine,  society  per 
forms  for  itself  almost  everything  which  is  ascribed  to  gov- 
ernment. 

To  understand  the  nature  and  quantity  of  government 
proper  for  man,  it  is  necessary  to  attend  to  his  character. 
As  nature  created  him  for  social  life,  she  fitted  him  for  the 
station  she  intended.  In  all  cases  she  made  his  natural 
wants  greater  than  his  individual  powers.  No  one  man  is 
capable,  without  the  aid  of  society,  of  supplying  his  own 
wants  ;  and  those  wants  acting  upon  every  individual,  im- 
pel the  whole  of  them  into  society,  as  naturally  as  gravita- 
tion acts  to  a  centre. 

But  she  has  gone  further.  She  has  not  onlv  forced  man 
into  society  bv  a  diversity  of  wants,  which  the  reciprocal 
aid  of  each  other  can  supply,  but  she  has  implanted  in  him 
a  system  of  social  affections,  which,  though  not  necessary  tc 
his  existence,  are  essential  to  his  happiness.  There  is  no 
period  in  life  when  this  love  for  society  ceases  to  act.  It  be- 
gins and  ends  with  our  being. 

If  we  examine,  with  attention,  into  the  composition  and 
constitution  of  man,  the  diversity  of  talents  in  different  men 
for  reciprocally  accommodating  the  wants  of  each  other,  his 
propensity  to  society,  and  consequently  to  preserve  the  ad- 
vantages resulting  from  it,  we  shall  easily  discover,  that  a 
great  part  of  what  is  called  government  is  mere  imposi- 
tion. 

Government  is  no  further  necessary  than  to  supply  the  few 
cases  to  which  society  and  civilization  are  not  conveniently 
competent ;  and  instances  are  not  wanting  to  show  that 
every  thing  which  government  can  usefully  add  thereto,  has 
been  performed  by  the  common  consent  of  society,  without 
government. 

For  upwards  of  two  years  from  the  commencement  of  the 
American  war,  and  a  longer  period,  in  several  of  the  Ameri- 
can states,  there  were  no  established  forms  of  government. 
The  old  governments  had  been  abolished,  and  the  country 
was  too  much  occupied  in  defence,  to  employ  its  attention 
in  establishing  new  governments  ;  yet,  during  this  interval, 
order  and  harmony  were  preserved  as  inviolate  as  in  any 


114  BIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

country  in  Europe.  There  is  a  natural  aptness  in  man,  and 
more  so  in  society,  because  it  embraces  a  greater  variety  of 
abilities  and  resources,  to  accommodate  itself  to  whatever 
situation  it  is  in.  The  instant  formal  government  is 
abolished,  society  begins  to  act.  A  general  association 
takes  place,  and  common  interest  produces  common  secu- 
rity. 

So  far  is  it  from  being  true,  as  has  been  pretended,  that 
the  abolition  of  any  formal  government  is  the  dissolution  of 
society,  it  acts  by  a  contrary  impulse,  and  brings  the  latter 
the  closer  together.  All  that  part  of  its  organization  which 
it  had  committed  to  its  government,  devolves  again  upon 
itself,  and  acts  through  its  medium.  When  men,  as  well 
from  natural  instinct  as  from  reciprocal  benefits,  have 
habituated  themselves  to  social  and  civilized  life,  there  is 
always  enough  of  its  principles  in  practice  to  carry  them 
through  any  changes  they  may  find  necessary  or  convenient 
to  make  in  their  government.  In  short,  man  is  so  naturally 
a  creature  of  society,  that  it  is  almost  impossible  to  put  him 
out  of  it. 

Formal  government  makes  but  a  small  part  of  civilized 
.ife ;  and  when  even  the  best  that  human  wisdom  can  devise 
is  established,  it  is  a  thing  more  in  name  and  idea,  than  in 
fact.  It  is  to  the  great  and  fundamental  principles  of 
society  and  civilization — to  the  common  usage  universally 
consented  to,  and  mutually  and  reciprocally  maintained — 
to  the  unceasing  circulation  of  interest,  which  passing  through 
its  innumerable  channels,  invigorates  the  whole  mass  of 
civilized  man — it  is  to  these  things,  infinitely  more  than  any 
thing  which  even  the  best  instituted  government  can  per- 
form, that  the  safety  and  prosperity  of  the  individual  and 
of  the  whole  depends. 

The  more  perfect  civilization  is,  the  less  occasion  has  it  for 
government,  because  the  more  does  it  regulate  its  own 
affairs,  and  govern  itself;  but  so  contrary  is  the  practice  of 
old  governments  to  the  reason  of  the  case,  that  the  expenses 
of  them  increase  in  the  proportion  they  ought  to  diminish. 
It  is  but  few  general  laws  that  civilized  fife  requires,  and 
those  of  such  common  usefulness,  that  whether  they  are  en- 
forced by  the  forms  of  government  or  not,  the  effect  will  be 
nearly  the  same.  If  we  consider  what  the  principles  are 
that  first  condense  man  into  society,  and  what  the  motives 
that  regulate  their  mutual  intercourse  afterwards,  we  shall 
find,  by  the  time  we  arrive  at  what  is  called  government, 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN.  115 

that  nearly  the  whole  of  the  business  is  performed  by  the 
natural  operation  of  the  parts  upon  each  other. 

Man,  with  respect  to  all  those  matters,  is  more  a  creature 
of  consistency  than  he  is  aware  of,  or  than  governments 
would  wish  him  to  believe.  All  the  great  laws  of  society 
are  laws  of  nature.  Those  of  trade  and  commerce,  whether 
with  respect  to  the  intercourse  of  individuals,  or  of  nations, 
are  laws  of  mutual  and  reciprocal  interest.  They  are  fol- 
lowed and  obeyed,  because  it  is  the  interest  of  the  parties  so 
to  do,  and  not  on  account  of  any  formal  laws  their  govern- 
ments may  impose  or  interpose. 

But  how  often  is  the  natural  propensity  to  society  dis- 
turbed or  destroyed  by  the  operations  of  government! 
When  the  latter,  instead  of  being  engrafted  on  the  princi- 
ples of  the  former,  assumes  to  exist  for  itself,  and  acts  by 
partialities  of  favor  and  oppression,  it  becomes  the  cause  of 
the  mischiefs  it  ought  to  prevent. 

If  we  look  back  to  the  riots  and  tumults,  which  at  various 
times  have  happened  in  England,  we  shall  find,  that  they 
did  not  proceed  from  the  want  of  a  government,  but  that 
government  was  itself  the  generating  cause ;  instead  of  con- 
solidating society,  it  divided  it ;  it  deprived  it  of  its  natural 
cohesion,  and  engendered  discontents  and  disorders,  which 
otherwise  would  not  have  existed.  In  those  associations 
which  men  promiscuously  form  for  the  purpose  of  trade,  or 
of  any  concern,  in  which  government  is  totally  out  of  the 
question,  and  in  which  they  act  merely  on  the  principles  of 
society,  we  see  how  naturally  the  various  parties  unite ;  and 
this  snows,  by  comparison,  that  governments,  so  far  from 
being  always  the  cause  or  means  of  order,  are  often  the 
destruction  of  it.  The  riots  of  1780  had  no  other  source  than 
the  remains  of  those  prejudices,  which  the  government  itself 
had  encouraged.  But  with  respect  to  England  there  are  also 
other  causes. 

Excess  and  inequality  of  taxation,  however  disguised  in 
the  means,  never  fail  to  appear  in  their  effect.  As  a  great 
mass  of  the  community  are  thrown  thereby  into  poverty  and 
discontent,  they  are  constantly  on  the  brink  of  commotion : 
and,  deprived,  as  they  unfortunately  are,  of  the  means  01 
information,  are  easily  heated  to  outrage.  Whatever  the 
apparent  cause  of  any  riots  may  be,  the  real  one  is  always 
want  of  happiness.  It  shows  that  something  is  wrong  m 
the  system  of  government,  that  injures  the  felicity  by  which 
society  is  to  be  preserved. 


116  EIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

But  as  fact  is  superior  to  reasoning,  the  instance  of  America 
presents  itself  to  confirm  these  observations.  If  there  is  a 
country  in  the  world,  where  concord,  according  to  common 
calculation,  would  be  least  expected,  it  is  America.  Made 
up,  as  it  is,  of  people  from  different  nations,*  accustomed  to 
different  forms  and  habits  of  government,  speaking  different 
languages,  and  more  different  in  their  modes  of  worship,  it 
would  appear  that  the  union  of  such  a  people  was  impracti- 
cable ;  but  by  the  simple  operation  of  constructing  govern- 
ment on  the  principles  of  society  and  the  rights  of  man, 
every  difficulty  retires,  and  all  the  parts  are  brought  into 
cordial  unison.  There,  the  poor  are  not  oppressed,  the  rich 
are  not  privileged.  Industry  is  not  mortified  by  the  splendid 
extravagance  of  a  court  rioting  at  its  expense.  Their  taxes 
are  few,  because  their  government  is  just ;  and  as  there  is 
nothing  to  render  them  wretched,  there  is  nothing  to  engen- 
der riots  and  tumults. 

A  metaphysical  man,  like  Mr.  Burke,  would  have  tortured 
his  invention  to  discover  how  such  a  people  could  be  gov- 
erned. He  would  have  supposed  that  some  must  be  man- 
aged by  fraud,  others  by  force,  and  all  by  some  contrivance ; 
that  genius  must  be  hired  to  impose  upon  ignorance,  and 
show  and  parade  to  fascinate  the  vulgar.  Lost  in  the  abun- 
dance of  his  researches,  he  would  have  resolved  and  re-re- 
solved, and  finally  overlooked  the  plain  and  easy  road  that 
lay  directly  before  him. 

One  of  the  great  advantages  of  the  American  revolution 
has  been,  that  it  led  to  a  discovery  of  the  principles,  and  laid 
open  the  imposition  of  governments.  All  the  revolutions 
till  then  had  been  worked  within  the  atmosphere  of  a  court, 
and  never  on  the  great  floor  of  a  nation.  The  parties  were 
always  of  the  class  of  courtiers ;  and  whatever  was  their 
rage  for  reformation,  they  carefully  preserved  the  fraud  of 
the  profession. 

*  That  part  of  America  which  is  generally  called  New-England,  including 
New-Hampshire,  Massachusetts,  Rhode  Island,  and  Connecticut,  is  peopled 
chiefly  by  English  descendants.  In  the  state  of  New-York  about  half  are 
Dutch,  the  rest  English,  Scotch,  and  Irish.  In  New-Jersey  a  mixture  of  Eng- 
lish and  Dutch  with  some  Scotch  and  Irish.  In  Pennsylyania  about  one  third 
are  English,  another  Germans,  and  the  remainder  Scotch  and  Irish,  with  some 
Swedes.  The  states  to  the  southward  have  a  greater  proportion  of  English 
than  the  middle  states,  but  in  all  of  them  there  is  a  mixture  ;  and  besides  those 
enumerated,  there  are  a  considerable  number  of  French,  and  some  few  of  all 
the  European  nations,  lying  on  the  coast.  The  most  numerous  religious 
denomination  are  the  Presbyterians ;  but  no  one  sect  is  established  abov«» 
another,  and  all  men  are  equally  citizens. 


EIGHTS   OF  MAJT.  117 

In  all  cases  they  took  care  to  represent  government  as  a 
thing  made  up  of  mysteries,  which  only  themselves  under- 
stood :  and  they  hid  from  the  understanding  of  the  nation, 
the  only  thing  that  was  beneficial  to  know,  namely,  thai 
government  is  nothing  more  than  a  national  association  acting 
on  the  principles  of  society. 

Having  thus  endeavored  to  show,  that  the  social  and 
civilized  state  of  man  is  capable  of  performing  within  itself, 
almost  every  thing  necessarv  to  its  protection  and  govern- 
ment, it  will  be  proper,  on  the  other  nand,  to  take  a  review 
of  the  present  old  governments,  and  examine  whether  their 
principles  and  practice  are  correspondent  thereto. 


CHAPTER  IL 

ON  THE   OBIQIN   OF  THE   PRESENT   OLD   GOVERNMENTS. 

IT  is  impossible  that  such  governments  as  have  hitherto 
existed  in  the  world,  could  have  commenced  by  any  other 
means  than  a  total  violation  of  every  principle,  sacred  and 
moral.  The  obscurity  in  which  the  origin  of  all  the  present 
old  governments  is  buried,  implies  the  iniquity  and  oisgrace 
with  which  they  began.  The  origin  of  the  present  govern- 
ments of  America  and  France  .will  ever  be  remembered,  be- 
cause it  is  honorable  to  record  it ;  but  with  respect  to  the 
rest,  even  flattery  has  consigned  them  to  the  tomb  of  time, 
without  an  inscription. 

It  could  have  been  no  difficult  thing  in  the  early  and  soli- 
tary ages  of  the  world,  while  the  chief  employment  of  men 
was  that  of  attending  flocks  and  herds,  for  a  banditti  of 
ruffians  to  overrun  a  country,  and  lay  it  under  contribution. 
Their  power  being  thus  established,  the  chief  of  the  band 
contrived  to  lose  the  name  of  robber  in  that  ot  monarch  ; 
and  hence  the  origin  of  monarchy  and  kings. 

The  origin  of  the  government  of  England,  so  far  as  it 
relates  to  what  is  called  its  line  of  monarchy,  being  one  ot 
the  latest,  is  perhaps  the  best  recorded.  The  hatred  which 
the  Norman  invasion  and  tyranny  begat,  must  have  been 
deeply  rooted  in  the  nation,  to  have  outlived  the  contrivance 
to  obliterate  it.  Though  not  a  courtier  will  talk  of  the  cur- 
few bell,  not  a  village  in  England  has  forgotten  it. 


SIGHTS   OF   MAU. 

i'hose  bands  of  robbers  having  parcelled  out  the  world, 
and  divided  it  into  dominions,  began,  as  is  naturally  the 
case,  to  quarrel  with  each  other.  What  at  first  was  obtained 
by  violence,  was  considered  by  others  as  lawful  to  be  taken, 
and  a  second  plunderer  succeeded  the  first.  They  alternately 
invaded  the  dominions  which  each  had  assigned  to  himself, 
and  the  brutality  with  which  they  treated  each  other  explains 
the  original  character  of  monarchy.  It  was  ruffian  torturing 
ruffian.  The  conqueror  considered  the  conquered  not  as  his 
prisoner,  but  his  property.  He  led  him  in  triumph  rattling 
in  chains,  and  doomed  him,  at  pleasure,  to  slavery  or  death. 
As  time  obliterated  the  history  of  their  beginning,  their  suc- 
cessors assumed  new  appearances,  to  cut  off  the  entail  of 
their  disgrace,  but  their  principles  and  objects  remained  the 
same.  What  at  first  was  plunder  assumed  the  softer  name 
of  revenue ;  and  the  power  they  originally  usurped,  they 
affected  to  inherit. 

From  such  beginning  of  governments,  what  could  be  ex- 
pected, but  a  continual  system  of  war  and  extortion  ?  It  has 
established  itself  into  a  trade.  The  vice  is  not  peculiar  to 
one  more  than  to  another,  but  is  the  common  principle  of  all. 
There  does  not  exist  within  such  governments  a  stamina 
whereon  to  ingraft  reformation ;  and  the  shortest  and  most 
effectual  remedy  is  to  begin  anew. 

What  scenes  of  horror,  what  perfection  of  iniquity, 
present  themselves  in  contemplating  the  character,  and 
reviewing  the  history  of  such  governments  !  If  we  would 
delineate  human  nature  with  a  baseness  of  heart,  and  hypo- 
crisy of  countenance,  that  reflection  would  shudder  at  and 
humanity  disown,  it  is  kings,  courts,  and  cabinets,  that  must 
sit  for  the  portrait.  Man,  as  he  is  naturally,  with  all  his 
faults  about  him,  is  not  up  to  the  character. 

Can  we  possibly  suppose  that  if  government  had  originated 
in  a  right  principle,  and  had  not  an  interest  in  pursuing  a 
wrong  one,  that  the  world  could  have  been  in  the  wretched 
and  quarrelsome  condition  we  have  seen  it  ?  What  induce- 
ment has  the  farmer,  while  following  the  plough,  to  lay 
aside  his  peaceful  pursuits  and  go  to  war  with  the  farmer  of 
another  country  ?  Or  what  inducement  has  the  manufac- 
turer ?  What  is  dominion  to  them,  or  to  any  class  of  men  in 
a  nation  ?  Does  it  add  an  acre  to  any  man's  estate,  or  raise 
its  value  ?  Are  not  conquest  and  defeat  each  of  the  same 
price,  and  taxes  the  never-failing  consequence?  Though 
'Jiis  reasoning  may  be  good  to  a  nation,  it  is  not  so  to  a 


BIGHTS    OF  MAN.  119 

government.     "War  is  the  faro-table  of  governments,  and 
nations  the  dupes  of  the  game. 

If  there  is  any  thing  to  wonder  at  in  this  miserable  scene 
of  governments,  more  than  might  be  expected,  it  is  the  pro- 
gress which  the  peaceful  arts  of  agriculture,  manufactures, 
and  commerce  have  made,  beneath  such  a  long  accumulat- 
ing load  of  discouragement  and  oppression.  It  serves  to 
show  that  instinct  in  animals  does  not  act  with  stronger 
impulse  than  the  principles  of  society  and  civilization  ope- 
rate in  man.  Under  all  discouragements,  he  pursues  nis 
object,  and  yields  to  nothing  but  impossibilities. 


CHAPTER  HL 

OF  THE  OLD  AND  NEW   SYSTEMS  OF  GOVERNMENT. 

NOTHING  can  appear  more  contradictory  than  the  prin- 
ciples on  which  the  old  governments  began,  and  the  con- 
dition to  which  society,  civilization  and  commerce,  are 
capable  of  carrying  mankind.  Government,  on  the  old 
system,  is  an  assumption  of  power,  for  the  aggrandizement 
of  itself ;  on  the  new,  a  delegation  of  power  for  the  common 
benefit  of  society.  The  former  supports  itself  by  keeping 
up  a  system  of  war ;  the  latter  promotes  a  system  of  peace, 
as  the  true  means  of  enriching  a  nation.  The  one  en- 
courages national  prejudices ;  the  other  promotes  universal 
society  as  the  means  of  universal  commerce.  The  one 
measures  its  prosperity  by  the  quantity  of  revenue  it  ex 
torts ;  the  other  proves  its  excellence,  by  the  small  quantity 
of  taxes  it  requires. 

Mr.  Burke  nas  talked  of  old  and  new  whigs.  If  he  can 
amuse  himself  with  childish  names  and  distinctions,  I  shaD 
not  interrupt  his  pleasure.  It  is  not  to  him,  but  to  the 
Abbe  Sieyes,  that  I  address  this  chapter.  I  am  already  en- 
gaged to  the  latter  gentleman,  to  discuss  the  subject  of 
monarchical  government ;  and  as  it  naturally  occurs  m  com- 
paring the  old  and  new  systems,  I  make  this  the  opportunity 
of  presenting  to  him  my  observations.  I  shall  occasionally 
take  Mr.  Burke  in  my  way. 

Though  \t  might  be  proved  that  the  system  of  government 


120  EIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

now  called  the  new,  is  the  most  ancient  in  principle  of  all 
that  have  existed,  being  founded  on  the  original  inherent 
rights  of  man:  vet,  as  tyranny  and  the  sword  have  sus- 
pended the  exercise  of  those  rights  for  many  centuries  past, 
it  serves  better  the  purpose  of  distinction  to  call  it  the  new, 
than  to  claim  the  right  of  calling  it  the  old. 

The  first  general  distinction  between  those  two  systems, 
is,  that  the  one  now  called  the  old  is  heredita?1?/,  either  in 
whole  or  in  part ;  and  the  new  is  entirely  representative.  It 
rejects  all  hereditary  government : 

1st,  As  being  an  imposition  on  mankind. 

2d,  As  inadequate  to  the  purposes  for  which  government 
is  necessary. 

With  respect  to  the  first  of  these  heads — It  cannot  be 
proved  by  what  right  hereditary  government  could  begin : 
neither  does  there  exist  within  the  compass  of  mortal  power, 
a  right  to  establish  it.  Man  has  no  authority  over  posterity 
in  matters  of  personal  right ;  and  therefore,  no  man,  or  body 
of  men,  had,  or  can  have,  a  right  to  set  up  hereditary 
government.  Were  even  ourselves  to  come  again  into 
existence,  instead  of  being  succeeded  by  posterity,  we  have 
not  now  the  right  of  taking  from  ourselves  the  rights  which 
would  then  be  ours.  On  what  ground,  then,  do  we  pretend 
to  take  them  from  others  ? 

All  hereditary  government  is  in  its  nature  tyranny.  An 
heritable  crown,  or  an  heritable  throne,  or  by  what  other 
fanciful  name  such  things  may  be  called,  have  no  other  sig- 
nificant explanation  than  that  mankind  are  heritable  pro- 
perty. To  inherit  a  government,  is  to  inherit  the  people,  as 
if  they  were  flocks  and  herds. 

With  respect  to  the  second  head,  that  of  being  inadequato 
to  the  purposes  for  which  government  is  necessary,  we  nave 
only  to  consider  what  government  essentially  is,  and  com- 
pare it  with  the  circumstances  to  which  hereditary  govern- 
ment is  subject? 

Government  ought  to  be  a  thing  always  in  full  maturity. 
It  ought  to  be  so  constructed  as  to  be  superior  to  all  the 
accidents  to  which  individual  man  is  subject :  and,  therefore, 
hereditary  succession,  by  being  subject  to  them  all,  is  the 
most  irregular  and  imperfect  of  all  the  systems  of  govern- 
ment. 

We  have  heard  the  rights  of  man  called  a  levelling  sys- 
tem :  but  the  only  system  to  which  the  word  levelhng  is 
truly  applicable,  is  the  hereditary  monarchical  system.  It  is 


BIGHTS   OF    MAN.  121 

a  system  of  mental  levelling.  It  indiscriminately  admit* 
every  species  of  character  to  the  same  authority.  V  ice  and 
virtue,  ignorance  and  wisdom,  in  short,  every  quality,  good 
or  bad,  is  put  on  the  same  level.  Kings  succeed  each  other, 
not  as  rationals,  but  as  animals.  Can  we  then  be  surprised 
at  the  abject  state  of  the  human  mind  in  monarchical  coun- 
tries, when  the  government  itself  is  formed  on  such  an  abject 
levelling  system  ? — It  has  no  fixed  character.  To-day  it  is 
one  thing ;  and  to-morrow  it  is  something  else.  It  changes 
with  the  temper  of  every  succeeding  individual,  and  is  sub- 
ject to  all  the  varieties  of  each.  It  is  government  through 
the  medium  of  passions  and  accidents.  It  appears  under 
all  the  various  characters  of  childhood,  decrepitude,  dotage, 
a  thing  at  nurse,  in  leading  strings,  and  on  crutches.  It 
reverses  the  wholesome  order  of  nature.  It  occasionally 
puts  children  over  men,  and  the  conceits  of  non-age  over 
wisdom  and  experience.  In  short,  we  cannot  conceive  a 
more  ridiculous  figure  of  government,  than  hereditary  suc- 
cession, in  all  its  cases,  presents. 

Could  it  be  made  a  decree  in  nature,  or  an  edict  regis- 
tered in  heaven,  and  man  could  know  it,  that  virtue  and 
wisdom  should  invariably  appertain  to  hereditary  succes- 
sion, the  objections  to  it  would  be  removed  ;  but  when  we 
see  that  nature  acts  as  if  she  disowned  and  sported  with  the 
hereditary  system ;  that  the  mental  characters  of  successors, 
in  all  countries,  are  below  the  average  of  human  under- 
standing ;  that  one  is  a  tyrant,  another  an  idiot,  a  third 
insane,  and  some  all  three  together,  it  is  impossible  to  attach 
confidence  to  it,  when  reason  in  man  has  power  to  act. 

It  is  not  to  the  abbe  Sieyes  that  I  need  apply  this  reason- 
ing ;  he  has  already  saved  me  that  trouble  by  giving  his 
own  opinion  on  the  case.  "  If  it  be  asked,"  says  he,  "  what 
is  my  opinion  with  respect  to  hereditary  right,  I  answer, 
without  hesitation,  that,  in  good  theory,  an  hereditary 
transmission  of  any  power  or  office,  can  never  accord  witn 
the  laws  of  true  representation.  Hereditaryship  is,  in  thia 
sense,  as  much  an  attaint  upon  principle,  as  an  outrage  upon 
society.  But  let  us,"  continues  he,  "refer  to  the  history  of 
all  elective  monarchies  and  principalities ;  is  there  one  in 
which  the  ele  itive  mode  is  not  worse  than  the  hereditary 
succession  ?" 

As  to  debating  on  which  is  the  worst  of  the  two,  it  is  ad- 
mitting both  to  be  bad ;  and  herein  we  are  agreed.  The 
preference  which  the  abbe  h  >«  given,  is  a  condemnation  of 


122  BIGHTS  OF  MAX. 

the  thing  he  prefers.  Such  a  mode  of  reasoning  on  such  a 
subject  is  inadmissible,  because  it  finally  amounts  to  an 
accusation  of  providence,  as  if  she  had  left  to  man  no  other 
choice  with  respect  to  government,  than  between  two  evils, 
the  best  of  which  he  admits  to  be,  "  <m  attaint  wpon  prin- 
ciple, and  an  out/rage  upon  society" 

Passing  over,  for  the  present,  all  the  evils  and  mischiefs 
which  monarchy  has  occasioned  in  the  world,  nothing  can 
more  effectually  prove  its  uselessness  in  a  state  of  ci/oil 
government,  than  making  it  hereditary.  Would  we  make 
any  office  hereditary  that  required  wisdom  and  abilities  to 
fill  it  ?  And  where  wisdom  and  abilities  are  not  necessary, 
such  an  office,  whatever  it  may  be,  is  superfluous  or  insig- 
nificant. 

Hereditary  succession  is  a  burlesque  upon  monarchy.  It 
puts  it  in  the  most  ridiculous  light,  by  presenting  it  as  an 
office  which  any  child  or  idiot  may  till.  It  requires  some 
talents  to  be  a  common  mechanic ;  but  to  be  a  king,  requires 
only  the  animal  figure  of  a  man — a  sort  of  breathing  auto- 
maton. This  sort  of  superstition  may  last  a  few  years 
more,  but  it  cannot  long  resist  the  awakened  reason  and 
interest  of  man. 

As  to  Mr.  Burke,  he  is  a  stickler  for  monarchy,  not  alto- 
gether as  a  pensioner,  if  he  is  one,  which  I  believe,  but  as  a 
political  man.  He  has  taken  up  a  contemptible  opinion  of 
mankind,  who,  in  their  turn,  are  taking  up  the  same  of  him. 
He  considers  them  as  a  herd  of  beings  that  must  be  governed 
by  fraud,  effigy,  and  show ;  and  an  idol  would  be  as  good  a 
figure  of  monarchy  with  him,  as  a  man.  I  will,  however,  do 
him  the  justice  to  say,  that,  with  respect  to  America,  he 
has  been  very  complimentary.  He  always  contended,  at 
least  in  my  hearing,  that  the  people  of  America  were  more 
enlightened  than  those  of  England,  or  of  any  country  in 
Europe ;  and  that  therefore  the  imposition  of  show  was  not 
necessary  in  their  governments. 

Though  the  comparison  between  hereditary  and  elective 
monarchy,  which  the  abbe  had  made,  is  unnecessary  to  the 
case,  because  the  representative  system  rejects  both ;  yet 
were  I  to  make  the  comparison,  I  should  decide  contrary  to 
what  he  has  done. 

The  civil  wars  which  have  originated  from  contested  here- 
ditary claims,  are  more  numerous,  and  have  been  more 
dreadful,  and  of  longer  continuance,  than  those  which  have 
been  occasioned  by  election.  All  the  civil  wars  in  France 


RIGHTS   OF   MAN.  123 

arose  from  the  hereditary  system ;  they  were  either  produced 
by  hereditary  claims,  or  by  the  imperfection  of  the  hereditary 
form,  which  admits  of  regencies,  or  monarchy  at  nurse. 
With  respect  to  England,  its  history  is  full  of  the  same  mis- 
fortunes. The  contests  for  succession  between  the  houses  of 
York  and  Lancaster,  lasted  a  whole  century ;  and  others  of 
a  similar  nature  have  renewed  themselves  since  that  period. 
Those  of  1715  and  1745,  were  of  the  same  kind.  The  suc- 
cession-war for  the  crown  of  Spain  embroiled  almost  half  of 
Europe.  The  disturbances  in  Holland  are  generated  from 
the  hereditaryship  of  the  stadtholder.  A  government  calling 
itself  free,  with  an  hereditary  office,  is  fike  a  thorn  in  the 
flesh,  that  produces  a  fermentation  which  endeavors  to  dis- 
charge it. 

But  I  might  go  further,  and  place  also  foreign  v  j,rs,  of 
whatever  kind,  to  the  same  cause.  It  is  by  adding  the 
evil  of  hereditary  succession  to  that  of  monarchy,  that  a 
permanent  family  interest  is  created,  whose  constant  objects 
are  dominion  and  revenue.  Poland,  though  an  elective 
monarchy,  has  had  fewer  wars  than  those  which  are  heredi- 
tary ;  and  it  is  the  only  government  that  has  made  a  volun- 
tary essay,  though  but  a  small  one,  to  reform  the  condition 
of  the  country. 

Having  thus  glanced  at  a  few  of  the  defects  of  the  old, 
or  hereditary  systems  of  government,  let  us  compare  it  with 
the  new  or  representative  system. 

The  representative  system  takes  society  and  civilization  for 
its  basis  ?  nature,  reason,  and  experience  for  its  guide. 

Experience,  in  all  ages,  and  in  all  countries,  has  demon- 
strated, that  it  is  impossible  to  control  nature  in  her  distri- 
bution of  mental  powers.  She  gives  them  as  she  pleases. 
Whatever  is  the  rule  by  which  she,  apparently  to  us,  scatters 
them  among  mankind,  that  rule  remains  a  secret  to  man.  It 
would  be  as  ridiculous  to  attempt  to  fix  the  hereditaryship 
of  human  beauty,  as  of  wisdom. 

Whatever  wisdom  constituency  is,  it  is  like  a  seedless 
plant ;  it  may  be  reared  when  it  appears ;  but  it  cannot  be 
voluntarily  produced.  There  is  always  a  sufficiency  some- 
where in  the  general  mass  of  society  for  all  purposes ;  but 
with  respect  to  the  parts  of  society,  it  is  continually  changing 
its  place.  It  rises  m  one  to-day,  in  another  to-morrow,  and 
has  most  probably  visited  in  rotation  every  family  of  the 
earth,  and  again  withdrawn. 

AP  this  is  the  order  of  nature,  the  order  of  government 


124  BIGHTS   OF  MAS. 

must  necessarily  follow  it,  or  government  will,  as  wo  see  it 
does,  degenerate  into  ignorance.  The  hereditary  system, 
therefore,  is  as  repugnant  to  human  wisdom,  as  to  numan 
rights ;  and  is  as  absurd  as  it  is  unjust. 

As  the  republic  of  letters  brings  forward  the  best  literary 
productions,  by  giving  to  genius  a  fair  and  universal  chance ; 
so  the  representative  system  of  government  is  calculated  to 
produce  the  wisest  laws,  by  collecting  wisdom  where  it  can 
be  found.  I  smile  to  myself  when  I  contemplate  the  ridicu- 
lous insignificance  into  which  literature  and  all  the  sciences 
would  sink,  were  they  made  hereditary ;  and  I  carry  the 
same  idea  into  governments.  An  hereditary  governor  is  as 
inconsistent  as  ar  hereditary  author.  I  know  not  whether 
Homer  or  Euclid  had  sons ;  but  I  will  venture  an  opinion, 
that  if  they  had,  and  had  left  their  works  unfinished,  those 
sons  could  not  have  completed  them. 

Do  we  need  a  stronger  evidence  of  the  absurdity  of  here- 
ditary government,  than  is  seen  in  the  descendants  of  those 
men,  in  any  line  of  life,  who  once  were  famous  ?  Is  there 
scarcely  an  instance  in  which  there  is  not  a  total  reverse  of 
the  character  ?  It  appears  as  if  the  tide  of  mental  faculties 
flowed  as  far  as  it  could  in  certain  channels,  and  then  forsook 
its  course,  and  arose  in  others.  How  irrational  then  is  the 
hereditary  system  which  establishes  channels  of  power,  in 
company  with  which  wisdom  refuses  to  flow  !  By  continu- 
ing this  absurdity,  man  is  in  perpetual  contradiction  with 
himself;  he  accepts,  for  a  king,  or  a  chief  magistrate, 
or  a  legislator,  a  person  whom  ne  would  not  elect  for  a 
constable. 

It  appears  to  general  observation,  that  revolutions  create 
genius  and  talents  ;  but  those  events  do  no  more  than  bring 
them  forward.  There  exists  in  man,  a  mass  of  sense  lying 
in  a  dormant  state,  and  which,  unless  something  excites  it 
to  action,  will  descend  with  him,  in  that  condition,  to  the 
grave.  As  it  is  to  the  advantage  of  society  that  the  whole 
of  its  faculties  should  be  employed,  the  construction  of  gov- 
ernment ought  to  be  such  as  to  bring  forward,  by  a  quiet 
and  regular  operation,  all  that  extent  of  capacity  which 
never  fails  to  appear  in  revolutions. 

This  cannot  take  place  in  the  insipid  state  of  hereditary 
government,  not  only  because  it  prevents,  but  because  it 
operates  to  benumb.  "WTien  the  mind  of  a  nation  is  bowed 
down  by  any  political  superstition  in  its  government,  such 
as  hereditary  succession  is,  it  loses  a  considerable  portion  of 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN.  125 

its  powers  on  all  other  subjects  and  objects.  Hereditary 
succession  requires  the  same  obedience  to  ignorance,  as  to 
wisdom ;  and  when  once  the  mind  can  bring  itself  to  pay 
this  indiscriminate  reverence,  it  descends  below  the  stature 
of  mental  manhood.  It  is  fit  to  be  great  only  in  little 
things.  It  acts  a  treachery  upon  itself,  and  suffocate*  the 
sensations  that  urge  to  detection. 

Though  the  ancient  governments  present  to  us  a  miserable 
'  picture  of  the  condition  of  man,  there  is  one  which  above  all 
others  exempts  itself  from  the^  general  description.  I  mean 
the  democracy  of  the  Athenians.  We  see  more  to  admire 
and  less  to  condemn,  in  that  great,  extraordinary  people, 
than  in  any  thing  which  history  affords. 

Mr.  Burke  is  so  little  acquainted  with  constituent  prin- 
ciples of  government,  that  he  confounds  democracy  and  re- 
presentation together.  Representation  was  a  thing  un- 
known  in  the  ancient  democracies.  In  those  the  mass  of 
the  people  met  and  enacted  laws  (grammatically  speaking) 
in  the  iirst  person.  Simple  democracy  was  no  other  than 
the  common  hall  of  the  ancients.  It  signifies  the  form,  ae 
well  as  the  public  principle  of  the  government.  As  these 
democracies  increased  in  population,  and  the  territory  ex- 
tended, the  simple  democratical  form  became  unwieldy  and 
impracticable ;  and  as  the  system  of  representation  was  not 
known,  the  consequence  was,  they  either  degenerated  con 
vulsively  into  monarchies,  or  became  absorbed  into  such  as 
then  existed.  Had  the  system  of  representation  been  then 
understood,  as  it  now  is,  there  is  no  reason  to  believe  that 
those  forms  of  government,  now  called  monarchical  or  aris- 
tocratical,  would  ever  have  taken  place.  It  was  the  want 
of  some  method  to  consolidate  the  parts  of  society,  after  it 
became  too  populous,  and  too  extensive  for  the  simple  de- 
mocratical form,  and  also  the  lax  and  solitary  condition  of 
shepherds  and  herdsmen  in  other  parts  of  tne  world,  that 
afforded  opportunities  to  those  unnatural  modes  of  govern- 
ment to  begin. 

As  it  is  necessary  to  clear  away  the  rubbish  of  errors,  into 
whish  the  subject  of  government  has  been  thrown,  I  shall 
proceed  to  remark  on  some  others. 

It  has  always  been  the  political  craft  of  courtiers  and  court 
governments,  to  abuse  something  which  they  called  repub- 
licanism; but  what  republicanism  was,  or  is,  they  never 
attempt  to  explain.  Let  us  examine  a  little  into  this  case. 

The  only  forms  of  government  are,  the  democratical,  th« 


126  BIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

aristocratical  the  monarchical,  and  what  is  now  called  the 
representative. 

What  is  called  a  republic,  is  not  any  particular  form  of 
government.  It  is  wholly  characteristical  of  the  purport, 
matter,  or  object  for  which  government  ought  to  be  insti- 
tuted, and  on  which  it  is  to  be  employed,  res-publica,  the 
public  affairs,  or  the  public  good ;  or,  literally  translated, 
the  public  thing.  It  is  a  word  of  a  good  original,  referring 
to  what  ought  to  be  the  character  and  business  of  govern 
ment ;  and  in  this  sense  it  is  naturally  opposed  to  the  word 
monarchy,  which  has  a  base  original  signification.  It  means 
arbitrary  power  in  an  individual  person ;  in  the  exercise  of 
which,  himself,  and  not  the  res-publica,  is  the  object. 

Every  government  that  does  not  act  on  the  principle  of  a 
republic,  or,  in  other  words,  that  does  not  make  the  res- 
publica  its  whole  and  sole  object,  is  not  a  good  government. 
Republican  government  is  no  other  than  government  estab- 
lished and  conducted  for  the  interest  of  the  public,  as  well 
individually  as  collectively.  It  is  not  necessarily  connected 
with  any  particular  form,  but  it  most  naturally  associates 
with  the  representative  form,  as  being  best  calculated  to 
secure  the  end  for  which  a  nation  is  at  the  expense  of  sup- 
porting it. 

Various  forms  ofgovernment  have  affected  to  style  them- 
selves republics.  Poland  calls  itself  a  republic,  but  is  in 
fact  an  hereditary  aristocracy,  with  what  is  called  an  elective 
monarchy.  Holland  calls  itself  a  republic,  which  is  chiefly 
aristocratical,  with  an  hereditary  stadtholdership.  But  the 
government  of  America,  which  is  wholly  on  the  system  of 
representation,  is  the  only  real  republic  in  character  and 
practice,  that  now  exists.  Its  government  has  no  other  ob- 
ject than  the  public  business  of  the  nation,  and  therefore  it 
is  properly  a  republic ;  and  the  Americans  have  taken  care 
that  this,  and  no  other,  shall  be  the  object  of  their  govern- 
ment, by  their  rejecting  every  thing  hereditary,  and  esta- 
blishing government  on  the  system  of  representation  only. 

Those  who  have  said  that  a  republic  is  not  a  form  of  gov- 
ernment calculated  for  countries  of  great  extent,  mistook,  in 
the  first  place,  the  business  of  a  government,  for  a  form  of 
government ;  for  the  res-publica  equally  appertains  to  every 
extent  of  territory  and  population.  And,  in  the  second 
pi  *ce,  if  they  meant  any  thing  with  respect  to  form,  it  was 
tie  simple  democratical  form,  such  as  was  the  mode  of  gov- 
&. ><ment  in  the  ancient  democracies,  in  which  there  wan  no 


RIGHTS   OF   MAN.  127 

representation.  The  case,  therefore,  is  not  that  a  republic 
cannot  be  extensive,  but  that  it  cannot  be  extensive  on  the 
simple  democratic  form ;  and  the  question  naturally  presents 
itself,  What  is  the  best  form  of  government  for  conducting 
the  RES-PUBLICA  or  PUBLIC  BUSINESS  of  a  nation,  after  it 
becomes  too  extensive  and  populous  for  the  simple,  democrati- 
cal form  f 

It  cannot  be  monarchy,  because  monarchy  is  subject  to  an 
objection  of  the  same  amount  to  which  the  democratical 
form  was  subject. 

It  is  possible  that  an  individual  may  lay  down  a  system 
of  principles,  on  which  government  shall  be  constitutionally 
established  to  any  extent  of  territory.  This  is  no  more  than 
an  operation  of  the  mind  acting  by  its  own  powers.  But 
the  practice  upon  those  principles,  as  applying  to  the  various 
and  numerous  circumstances  of  a  nation,  its  agriculture, 
manufactures,  trade,  commerce,  &c.,  require  a  knowledge, 
of  a  different  kind,  and  which  can  be  had  only  from  the 
various  parts  of  society.  It  is  an  assemblage  of  practical 
knowledge,  which  no  one  individual  can  possess  ;  and  there- 
fore the  monarchical  form  is  as  much  limited,  in  useful  prac- 
tice, from  the  incompetency  of  knowledge,  as  was  the  demo- 
cratical form,  from  tne  multiplicity  of  population.  The  one 
degenerates,  by  extension,  into  confusion ;  the  other  into 
ignorance  and  incapacity,  of  which  all  the  great  monarchies 
are  an  evidence.  The  monarchical  form,  therefore,  could 
not  be  a  substitute  for  the  democratical,  because  it  has  equal 
inconveniences. 

Much  less  could  it  when  made  hereditary.  This  is  the 
most  effectual  of  all  forms  to  preclude  knowledge.  Neither 
could  the  high  democratical  mind  have  voluntarily  yielded 
itself  to  be  governed  by  children  and  idiots,  and  all  the  mot- 
ley insignificance  of  character,  which  attends  such  a  mere 
animal  system,  the  disgrace  and  the  reproach  of  reason  and 
of  man. 

As  to  the  aristocratical  form;  it  has  the  same  vices  and 
defects  with  the  monarchical,  except  that  the  chance  of 
abilities  is  better  from  the  proportion  of  numbers,  but 
there  is  still  no  security  for  the  right  use  and  application 
of  them.* 

Referring,  then,  to  the  original  simple  democracy,  it 
affords  the  true  data  from  which  government  on  a  largo 

*  For  a  character  of  aristocracy,  the  reader  la  referred  to  Rights  of  Man, 
part  i.  p.  43  et  seq. 


128  BIGHTS   OF   MAI*. 

scale  can  begin.  It  is  incapable  of  extension,  not  from  it* 
principle,  but  from  the  inconvenience  of  its  form;  and 
monarchy  and  aristocracy  from  their  incapacity.  Retaining, 
then,  democracy  as  the  ground,  and  rejecting  the  corrupt 
systems  of  monarchy  and  aristocracy,  the  representative  sys- 
tem naturally  presents  itself;  remedying  at  once  the  defects 
of  the  simple  democracy  as  to  form,  and  the  incapacity  of 
the  other  two  with  regard  to  knowledge. 

Simple  democracy  was  society  governing  itself  without 
the  use  of  secondary  means.  By  ingrafting  representation 
upon  democracy,  we  arrive  at  a  system  of  government  capa- 
ble of  embracing  and  confederating  all  the  various  interests 
and  every  extent  of  territory  and  population ;  and  that  also 
with  advantages  as  much  superior  to  hereditary  government, 
as  the  republic  of  letters  is  to  hereditary  literature. 

It  is  on  this  system  that  the  American  government  was 
founded.  It  is  representation  ingrafted  upon  democracy. 
It  has  settled  the  form  by  a  scale  parallel  in  all  cases  to  the 
extent  of  the  principle.  What  Athens  was  in  miniature, 
America  will  be  in  magnitude.  The  one  was  the  wonder  of 
the  ancient  world — -the  other  is  becoming  the  admiration 
and  model  of  the  present.  It  is  the  easiest  of  all  the  forms 
of  government  to  be  understood,  and  the  most  eligible  in 
practice ;  and  excludes  at  once  the  ignorance  and  insecurity 
of  the  hereditary  mode,  and  the  inconvenience  of  the  simple- 
democracy. 

It  is  impossible  to  conceive  a  system  of  government  capa 
ble  of  acting  over  such  an  extent  of  territory,  and  such  a 
circle  of  interests,  as  is  produced  by  the  operation  of  repre- 
sentation. France,  great  and  populous  as  it  is,  is  but  a  spot 
in  the  capaciousness  of  the  system.  It  adapts  itself  to  all 
possible  cases.  It  is  preferable  to  simple  democracy  even  in 
small  territories.  Athens,  by  representation,  would  have 
surpassed  her  own  democracy. 

That  which  is  called  government,  or  rather  that  which  we 
ought  to  conceive  government  to  be,  is  no  more  than  some 
common  centre,  in  which  all  the  parts  of  society  unite.  This 
cannot  be  established  by  any  method  so  conducive  to  the 
various  interests  of  the  community,  as  by  the  representative 
system.  It  concentrates  the  knowledge  necessary  to  the  in- 
terests of  the  parts,  and  of  the  whole.  It  places  government 
in  a  state  of  constant  maturity.  It  is,  as  has  already  been 
observed,  never  young,  never  old.  It  is  subject  neither  to 
nonage  nor  dotajre.  It  is  never  in  the  cradle  nor  on  crutches. 


RIGHTS   OF   MAN.  129 

It  admits  not  of  a  separation  between  knowledge  and  power, 
and  is  superior,  as  government  ought  always  to  he,  to  all  the 
the  accidents  of  individual  man,  and  is  therefore  superior  to 
what  is  called  monarchy. 

A  nation  is  not  a  body,  the  figure  of  which  is  to  be  repre- 
sented by  the  human  body ;  but  is  like  a  body  contained 
within  a  circle,  having  a  common  centre,  in  which  every  ra- 
dius meets ;  and  that  centre  is  formed  by  representation.  To 
connect  representation  with  what  is  called  monarchy,  is 
eccentric  government.  Representation  is  of  itself  the  dele- 

fated  monarchy  of  a  nation,  and  cannot  debase  itself  by 
ividing  it  with  another. 

Mr.  Burke  has  two  or  three  times  in  his  parliamentary 
speeches,  and  in  his  publications,  made  use  of  a  jingle  of 
words  that  conveyed  no  ideas.  Speaking  of  government,  he 
says,  "  It  is  better  to  have  monarchy  for  its  basis,  and  repub- 
licanism for  its  corrective,  than  republicanism  for  its  basis, 
and  monarchy  for  its  corrective."  If  he  means  that  it  is 
better  to  correct  folly  with  wisdom,  than  wisdom  with  follv, 
I  will  no  otherwise  contend  with  him,  than  to  say,  it  would 
be  much  better  to  reject  the  folly  altogether. 

But  what  is  this  tiling  which  Mr.  Burke  calls  monarchy  ? 
Will  he  explain  it :  all  mankind  can  understand  what  repre- 
sentation is ;  and  that  it  must  necessarily  include  a  variety 
of  knowledge  and  talents.  But  what  security  is  there  for 
the  same  qualities  on  the  part  of  monarchy  ?  Or,  when  this 
monarchy  is  a  child,  where  then  is  the  wisdom  ?  What  does 
it  know  about  government?  Who  then  is  the  monarch  ?  or 
where  is  the  monarchy  ?  If  it  is  to  be  performed  by  regency, 
it  proves  to  be  a  farce.  A  regency  is  a  mock  species  of  re- 

Eiblic,  and  the  whole  of  monarchy  deserves  no  better  appel- 
tion.  It  is  a  thing  as  various  as  imagination  can  paint. 
It  has  none  of  the  stable  character  that  government  ought 
to  possess.  Every  succession  is  a  revolution,  and  every  re- 
gency a  counter-revolution.  The  whole  of  it  is  a  scene  of 
perpetual  court  cabal  and  intrigue,  of  which  Mr.  Burke  is 
himself  an  instance. 

Whether  I  have  too  little  sense  to  see,  or  too  much  to  be 
imposed  upon :  whether  I  have  too  much  or  too  little  pride, 
or  of  anything  else,  I  leave  out  of  the  question ;  but  certain 
it  is,  that  what  is  called  monarchy,  always  appears  to  me  a 
silly,  contemptible  thing.  I  compare  it  to  something  kept 
behind  a  curtain,  about  which  there  is  a  great  deal  of  bustle 
and  fuss,  and  a  wonderful  P^  nf  Reeming  solemnity ;  but 


180  EIGHTS  OF  MAN. 

when,  by  any  accident,  the  curtain  happens  to  be  open  and 
the  company  see  what  it  is,  they  burst  into  laughter. 

In  the  representative  system  of  government,  nothing  like 
this  can  happen.  Like  the  nation  itself,  it  possesses  a  per- 
petual stamina,  as  well  of  body  as  of  mind,  and  presents  itself 
on  the  open  theatre  of  the  world  in  a  fair  and  manly  manner. 
Whatever  are  its  excellencies  or  its  defects,  they  are  visible 
to  all.  It  exists  not  by  fraud  and  mystery  ;  it  deals  not  in 
cant  and  sophistry ;  but  inspires  a  language,  that,  passing 
from  heart  to  heart,  is  felt  and  understood. 

We  mugt  shut  our  eyes  against  reason,  we  must  baselj 
degrade  our  understanding,  not  to  see  the  folly  of  what  is 
called  monarchy.  Nature  is  orderly  in  all  her  works ;  but 
this  is  a  mode  of  government  that  counteracts  nature.  It 
turns  the  progress  of  the  human  faculties  upside  down. 
It  subjects  age  to  be  governed  by  children,  and  wisdom  by 
follv. 

On  the  contrary,  the  representative  system  is  always 
parallel  with  the  order  and  immutable  laws  of  nature,  and 
meets  the  reason  of  man  in  every  part.  For  example  : 

In  the  American  federal  government,  more  power  is  dele- 
gated to  the  president  of  the  United  States,  than  to  any 
other  individual  member  of  congress.  He  cannot,  therefore, 
be  elected  to  this  office  under  the  age  of  thirty-five  years. 
By  this  time  the  judgment  of  man  becomes  matured,  and  he 
has  lived  long  enough  to  become  acquainted  with  men  and 
things,  and  the  country  with  him.  But  on  the  monarchical 
plan  (exclusive  of  the  numerous  chances  there  are  against 
every  man  born  into  the  world,  of  drawing  a  prize  in  the 
lottery  of  human  faculties,)  the  next  in  succession,  whatever 
he  may  be,  is  put  at  the  head  of  a  nation,  and  of  a  govern- 
ment, at  the  age  of  eighteen  years.  Does  this  appear  like  an 
act  of  wisdom!  Is  it  consistent  with  the  proper  dignity  and 
the  manly  character  of  a  nation  ?  Where  is  the  propriety  of 
calling  such  a  lad  the  father  of  the  people  ? — In  all  other 
cases,  a  person  is  a  minor  until  the  age  of  twenty-one  years. 
Before  this  period  he  is  not  trusted  with  the  management  of 
an  acre  of  land,  or  with  the  heritable  property  of  a  flock  of 
sheep,  or  an  herd  of  swine ;  but  wonderful  to  tell !  he  may 
at  the  age  of  eighteen  years,  be  trusted  with  a  nation. 

That  monarcny  is  all  a  bubble,  a  mere  court  artifice  to 
procure  money  is  evident  (at  least  to  me)  in  every  character 
in  which  it  can  be  viewed.  It  would  be  almost  impossible, 
on  the  rational  system  of  representative  government,  to  make 


RIGHTS   OF   MAN.  131 

oat  a  bill  of  expenses  to  such  an  enormous  amount  as  this 
deception  admits.  Government  is  not  of  itself  a  very  charge- 
able institution.  The  whole  expense  of  the  federal  govern- 
ment of  America,  founded,  as  I  have  already  said,  on  the 
system  of  representation,  and  extending  over  a  country 
nearly  ten  times  as  large  as  England,  is  but  six  hundred 
thousand  dollars,  or  one  hundred  and  thirty  thousand  pounds 
sterling. 

I  presume  that  no  man  in  his  sober  senses  will  compare 
the  character  of  any  of  the  kings  of  Europe,  with  that  of 
general  Washington.  Yet,  in  France,  and  also  in  England, 
the  expense  of  the  civil  list  only,  for  the  support  of  one  man, 
is  eight  times  greater  than  the  whole  expense  of  the  federal 
government  of  America.  To  assign  a  reason  for  this  appears 
almost  impossible.  The  generality  of  people  in  America, 
especially  the  poor,  are  more  able  to  pay  taxes,  than  the 
generality  of  people  either  in  France  or  England. 

But  the  case  is,  that  the  representative  system  diffuses 
such  a  body  of  knowledge  throughout  the  nation,  on  the  sub- 
ject of  government,  as  to  explode  ignorance  and  preclude 
imposition.  The  craft  of  courts  cannot  be  acted  on  that 
ground.  There  is  no  place  for  mystery ;  no  where  for  it  to 
begin.  Those  who  are  not  in  the  representation,  know  as 
much  of  the  nature  of  business  as  those  who  are.  An  affec- 
tation of  mysterious  importance  would  there  be  scouted. 
Nations  can  have  no  secrets ;  and  the  secrets  of  courts,  like 
those  of  individuals,  are  always  their  defects. 

In  the  representative  system,  the  reason  for  every  thing 
must  publicly  appear.  Every  man  is  a  proprietor  in  govern- 
ment, and  considers  it  a  necessary  part  of  his  business  to 
understand.  It  concerns  his  interest  because  it  affects  his 
property.  He  examines  the  cost,  and  compares  it  with  the 
advantages ;  and  above  all,  he  does  not  adopt  the  slavish 
custom  of  following  what  in  other  governments  are  called 
leaders. 

It  can  only  be  by  blinding  the  understanding  of  man,  and 
making  him  believe  that  government  is  some  wonderful 
mysterious  thing,  that  excessive  revenues  are  obtained. 
Monarchy  is  well  calculated  to  ensure  this  end.  It  is  the 
popery  01  government ;  a  thing  kept  up  to  amuse  the  igno- 
rant, and  quiet  them  into  paying  taxes. 

The  government  of  a  free  country,  properly  speaking,  is 
not  in  the  persons,  but  in  the  laws.  The  enacting  of  those 
requires  no  great  expense ;  and  when  they  Are  administered, 


EIGHTS   OF   MJLN. 


the  whole  of  civil  government  is  performed  —  the  rest  is  all 
court  contrivance. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

OH  CONSTITUTIONS. 

THAT  men  mean  distinct  and  separate  things  when  they 
talk  of  constitutions  and  of  governments,  is  evident ;  or,  why 
are  those  terms  distinctly  and  separately  used  ?  A  constitu- 
tion is  not  the  act  of  a  government,  but  of  a  people  constituting 
a  government ;  and  government  without  a  constitution,  is 
power  without  a  right. 

All  power  exercised  over  a  nation  must  have  some  begin- 
ning. It  must  be  either  delegated,  or  assumed.  There  are 
no  other  sources.  All  delegated  power  is  trust,  and  all 
assumed  power  is  usurpation.  Time  does  not  alter  the  nature 
and  quality  of  either. 

In  viewing  this  subject,  the  case  and  circumstances  of 
America  present  themselves  as  in  the  beginning  of  a  world  ; 
and  our  inquiry  into  the  origin  of  government  is  shortened, 
by  referring  to  the  facts  that  have  arisen  in  our  jiay.  We 
have  no  occasion  to  roam  for  information  into  the  obscure 
field  of  antiquity,  nor  hazard  ourselves  upon  conjecture.  We 
are  brought  at  once  to  the  point  of  seeing  government  begin, 
as  if  we  had  lived  in  the  beginning  of  time.  The  real  volume, 
not  of  history,  but  of  facts,  is  directly  before  us,  unmutilated 
by  contrivance,  or  the  errors  of  tradition. 

I  will  here  concisely  state  the  commencement  of  the 
American  constitutions;  by  which  the  difference  between 
constitutions  and  governments  will  sufficiently  appear. 

It  may  not  be  improper  to  remind  the  reader,  that  the 
United  States  of  America  consist  of  thirteen  states,  each  of 
which  established  a  government  for  itself,  after  the  declara- 
tion of  independence,  of  the  fourth  of  July,  1776.  Each 
state  acted  independently  of  the  rest,  in  forming  its  govern- 
ment ;  but  the  same  general  principle  pervades  the  whole. 
When  the  several  state  governments  were  formed,  they  pro- 
ceeded to  form  the  federal  government,  that  acts  over  the 
whole  in  all  matters  which  concern  the  interest  of  the  whole, 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN.  183 

or  which  relate  to  the  intercourse  of  the  several  states  with 
each  other,  or  with  foreign  nations.  I  will  begin  with  giv- 
ing an  instance  from  one  of  the  state  governments  (that  of 
Pennsylvania)  and  then  proceed  to  the  federal  govern 
ment. 

The  state  of  Pennsylvania,  though  nearly  of  the  same  ex 
tent  of  territory  with  England,  was  then  divided  into  twelve 
counties.  Each  of  those  counties  had  elected  a  committee  at 
the  commencement  of  the  dispute  with  the  English  govern- 
ment ;  and  as  the  city  of  Philadelphia,  which  also  nad  its 
committee,  was  the  most  central  for  intelligence,  it  became 
the  centre  of  communication  to  the  several  county  commit- 
tees. When  it  became  necessary  to  proceed  to  the  forma- 
tion of  a  government,  the  committee  of  Philadelphia  pro- 
posed a  conference  of  all  the  county  committees,  to  be  held 
in  that  city,  and  which  met  the  latter  end  of  July,  1776. 

Though  these  committees  had  been  elected  by  the  people, 
they  were  not  elected  expressly  for  the  purpose,  nor  invested 
witn  the  authority  of  forming  a  constitution :  and  as  they 
could  not,  consistently  with  the  American  idea  of  rights, 
assume  such  a  power,  they  could  only  confer  upon  the 
matter,  and  put  it  into  a  tram  of  operation.  The  conferees, 
therefore  did  no  more  than  state  the  case  and  recommend 
to  the  several  counties  to  elect  six  representatives  for  each 
county,  to  meet  in  convention  at  Philadelphia,  with  powers 
to  form  a  constitution  and  propose  it  for  public  consider- 
ation. 

This  convention,  of  which  Benjamin  Franklin  was  presi- 
dent, having  met  and  deliberated,  and  agreed  upon  a  consti- 
tution, they  next  ordered  it  to  be  published,  not  as  a  thing 
established,  but  for  the  consideration  of  the  whole  people, 
their  approbation  or  rejection,  and  then  adjourned  to  a 
stated  time.  When  the  time  of  adjournment  was  expired, 
the  convention  re-assembled  ;  and  as  the  general  opinion  of 
the  people  in  approbation  of  it  was  then  known,  the  consti- 
tution was  signed,  sealed,  and  proclaimed  on  the  authority 
of  the  people,  and  the  original  instrument  deposited  as  * 
public  record.  The  convention  then  appointed  a  day  for 
the  general  election  of  the  representatives  who  were  to  com- 
pose the  government,  and  the  time  it  should  commence; 
and  having  done  this,  they  dissolved,  and  returned  to  their 
several  homes  and  occupations. 

In  this  constitution  were  laid  down,  first,  a  declaration  of 
rights.  Then  followed  the  form  which  the  government 


134  SIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

should  have,  and  the  powers  it  should  possess — the  authority 
of  courts  of  judicature  and  of  juries — the  manner ^in  which 
elections  should  be  conducted,  and  the  proportion  of  repre- 
sentatives to  the  number  of  electors — the  time  which  each 
succeeding  assembly  should  continue,  which  was  one  year — 
the  mode  of  levying,  and  of  accounting  for  the  expenditure, 
of  public  money — of  appointing  public  officers,  &c. 

No  article  of  this  constitution  could  be  altered  or  infringed 
at  the  discretion  of  the  government  that  was  to  ensue.  It 
was  to  that  government  a  law.  But  as  it  would  have  been 
unwise  to  preclude  the  benefit  of  experience,  and  in  order 
also  to  prevent  the  accumulation  of  errors,  if  any  should  be 
found,  and  to  preserve  an  unison  of  government  with  the 
circumstances  of  the  state  at  all  times,  the  constitution  pro- 
vided, that,  at  the  expiration  of  every  seven  years,  a  con- 
vention should  be  elected ;  for  the  express  purpose  of  revis- 
ing the  constitution,  and  making  alterations,  additions, 
or  abolitions  therein,  if  any  such  should  be  found  neces- 
sary. 

Here  we  see  a  regular  process — a  government  issuing  out 
of  a  constitution,  formed  by  the  people  in  their  original 
character;  and  that  constitution,  serving,  not  only  as  an 
authority,  but  as  a  law  of  control  to  the  government.  It 
was  the  political  bible  of  the  state.  Scarcely  a  family  was 
without  it.  Every  member  of  the  government  ha-d  a  copy  ; 
and  nothing  was  more  common,  when  any  debate  arose 
on  the  principle  of  a  bill,  or  on  the  extent  of  any  species  of 
authority,  than  for  the  members  to  take  the  printed  consti- 
tution out  of  their  pocket,  and  read  the  chapter  with  which 
such  matter  in  debate  was  connected. 

Having  thus  given  an  instance  from  one  of  the  states,  I 
will  show  the  proceedings  by  which  the  federal  constitution 
of  the  United  States  arose  and  was  formed. 

Congress,  at  its  two  first  meetings,  in  September  1774, 
and  May  1775,  was  nothing  more  tnan  a  deputation  from 
the  legislatures  of  the  several  provinces,  afterwards  states ; 
and  had  no  other  authority  than  what  arose  from  common 
consent,  and  the  necessity  of  its  acting  as  a  public  body, 
In  every  thing  which  related  to  the  internal  affairs  of  Ame 
rica,  congress  went  no  further  than  to  issue  recommendations, 
to  the  several  provincial  assemblies,  who  at  discretion 
adopted  them  or  not.  Nothing  on  the  part  of  congress  waa 
compulsive ;  yet,  in  this  situation,  it  was  more  faithfully  and 
affectionately  obeyed,  than  was  any  government  in  Europe. 


BIGHTS    OF   MAN.  135 

This  instance,  like  that  of  the  national  assembly  of  France, 
sufficiently  shows,  that  the  strength  of  government  does  not 
consist  in  any  thing  within  itself,  but  in  the  attachment  c  f 
a  nation,  and  the  interest  which  the  people  feel  in  support- 
ing it.  "When  this  is  lost,  government  is  but  a  child  in 
power ;  and  though,  like  the  old  government  of  France, 
it  may  harass  individuals  for  a  while,  it  but  facilitates  its 
own  fall. 

After  the  declaration  of  independence,  it  became  consis- 
tent with  the  principle  on  which  representative  government 
is  founded,  that  the  authority  of  congress  should  be  defined 
and  established.  Whether  that  authority  should  be  more  or 
less  than  congress  then  discretionately  exercised,  was  not 
then  the  question.  It  was  merely  the  rectitude  of  the 
measure. 

For  this  purpose  the  act,  called  the  act  of  confederation 
(which  was  a  sort  of  imperfect  federal  constitution)  was 
proposed,  and,  after  long  deliberation,  was  concluded  in  the 
year  1781.  It  was  not  the  act  of  congress,  because  it  is 
repugnant  to  the  principles  of  representative  government 
that  a  body  should  give  power  to  itself.  Congress  first 
informed  the  several  states  of  the  powers  which  it  conceived 
were  necessary  to  be  invested  in  the  union,  to  enable  it  to 
perform  the  duties  and  services  required  from  it ;  and  the 
states  severally  agreed  with  each  other,  and  concentrated  in 
congress  those  powers. 

It  may  not  be  improper  to  observe,  that  in  both  those 
instances  (the  one  of  Pennsylvania,  and  the  other  of  the 
United  States)  there  is  no  such  thing  as  the  idea  of  a  com- 
pact between  the  people  on  one  side,  and  the  government 
on  the  other.  The  compact  was  that  of  the  people  with 
each  other,  to  produce  and  constitute  a  government.  To 
suppose  that  any  government  can  be  a  party  to  a  compact 
with  the  whole  people,  is  to  suppose  it  to  have  existence 
before  it  can  have  a  right  to  exist.  The  only  instance  in 
which  a  compact  can  take  place  between  the  people  and 
those  who  exercise  the  government,  is,  that  the  people  shall 
pay  them,  while  they  choose  to  employ  them. 

Government  is  not  a  trade  which  any  man  or  body  of  men 
has  a  right  to  set  up  and  exercise  for  his  own  emolument, 
but  is  altogether  a  trust,  in  right  of  those  by  whom  that 
trust  is  delegated,  and  by  whom  it  is  always  resumable.  It 
has  of  itself  no  rights ;  they  are  altogether  duties. 

Having  thus  given  two  instances  of  the  original  formation 


186  EIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

of  a  constitution,  T  will  show  the  manner  in  which  both  have 
been  changed  since  their  first  establishment. 

The  powers  vested  in  the  governments  of  the  several 
states,  by  the  state  constitutions,  were  found,  upon  experi- 
ence, to  be  too  great ;  and  those  vested  in  the  federal 
government,  by  the  act  of  confederation,  too  little.  The 
defect  was  not  in  the  principle,  but  in  the  distribution  of 
power. 

Numerous  publications,  in  pamphlets  and  in  the  newspa- 
pers, appeared  on  the  propriety  and  necessity  of  new-model- 
ling the  federal  government.  After  some  time  of  public 
discussion,  carried  on  through  the  channel  of  the  press,  and 
in  conversations,  the  state  of  Virginia,  experiencing  some 
inconvenience  with  respect  to  commerce,  proposed  holding 
a  continental  conference  ;  in  consequence  of  which,  a  depu- 
tation from  five  or  six  of  the  state  assemblies  met  at  Anna- 
polis in  Maryland,  in  1786.  This  meeting,  not  conceiving 
itself  sufficiently  authorized  to  go  into  the  business  of  a 
reform,  did  no  more  than  state  their  general  opinions  of  the 
propriety  of  the  measure,  and  recommend  that  a  convention 
of  all  the  states  should  be  held  the  year  following. 

This  convention  met  at  Philadelphia,  in  May  1787,  of 
which  general  Washington  was  elected  president.  He  was 
not  at  that  time  connected  with  any  of  the  state  governments, 
or  with  congress.  He  delivered  up  his  commission  when 
the  war  ended,  and  since  then  had  lived  a  private  citizen. 

The  convention  went  deeply  into  all  the  subjects ;  and 
having,  after  a  variety  of  debate  and  investigation,  agreed 
among  themselves  upon  the  several  parts  of  a  federal  con- 
stitution, the  next  question  was,  the  manner  of  giving  it 
authority  and  practice. 

For  this  purpose,  they  did  not,  like  a  cabal  of  courtiers, 
send  for  a  Dutch  stadtholder,  or  a  German  elector ;  but  they 
referred  the  whole  matter  to  the  sense  and  interest  of  the 
country. 

They  first  directed  that  the  proposed  constitution  should 
be  published.  Second,  that  each  state  should  elect  a  con- 
vention expressly  for  the  purpose  of  taking  it  into  conside- 
ration, and  of  ratifying  or  rejecting  it ;  and  that  as  soon  as 
the  approbation  and  ratification  of  any  nine  states  should 
be  given,  that  those  states  should  proceed  to  the  election  of 
their  proportion  of  members  to  the  new  federal  government ; 
and  that  the  operation  .of  it  should  then  begin,  and  the  for- 
mer federal  government  cease. 


BIGHTS    OF   MAN.  137 

The  several  estates  proceeded  accordingly  to  elect  their 
conventions  ;  some  of  those  conventions  ratified  the  consti- 
tution by  very  large  majorities,  and  two  or  three  unani- 
mously. In  others,  there  were  much  debate  and  division  of 
opinion.  In  the  Massachusetts  convention,  which  met  at 
Boston,  the  majority  was  not  above  nineteen  or  twenty,  in 
about  three  hundred  members ;  but  such  is  the  nature  of 
representative  government,  that  it  quietly  decides  all  mat- 
ters by  majority.  After  the  debate  in  the  Massachusetts 
convention  was  closed,  and  the  vote  taken,  the  objecting 
members  rose  and  declared,  "  That  though  they  had  argued 
and  voted  against  it,  because  certain  parts  appeared  to  them 
in  a  different  light  to  what  they  appeared  to  other  members  / 
yet,  as  the  vote  liad  been  decided  ^n  favor  of  the  constitution 
as  proposed,  they  should  give  it  the  same  practical  support  as 
if  tliey  had  voted  for  it. 

As  soon  as  nine  states  had  concurred,  (and  the  rest  fol- 
lowed in  the  order  their  conventions  were  elected,)  the  olu 
fabric  of  the  federal  government  was  taken  down,  and  a  new 
one  erected,  of  which  general  Washington  is  president.  In 
this  place  I  cannot  help  remarking,  that  the  character  and 
cervices  of  this  gentleman  are  sufficient  to  put  all  those  men 
called  kings  to  shame.  While  they  are  receiving  from  the 
sweat  and  labors  of  mankind  a  prodigality  of  pay,  to  which 
which  neither  their  abilities  nor  their  services  can  entitle 
them,  he  is  rendering  every  service  in  his  power,  and  refus- 
ing every  pecuniary  reward.  He  accepted  no  pay  as  Com- 
mander-in-chief; he  accepts  none  as  president  01  the  United 
States. 

After  the  new  federal  constitution  was  established,  the 
state  of  Pennsylvania,  conceiving  that  some  parts  of  its  own 
constitution  required  to  be  altered,  elected  a  convention  for 
that  purpose.  The  proposed  alterations  were  published,  and 
the  people  concurring  therein,  they  were  established. 

In  forming  those  constitutions,  or  in  altering  them,  little 
or  no  inconvenience  took  place.  The  ordinary  course  of 
things  was  not  interrupted,  and  the  advantages  have  been 
much.  It  is  always  the  interest  of  a  far  greater  number  of 
people  in  a  nation  to  have  things  right,  than  to  let  them 
remain  wrong  ;  and  when  public  matters  are  open  to  debate, 
and  the  public  judgment  free,  it  will  not  decide  wrong, 
unless  it  decides  too  nastily. 

In  the  two  instances  of  changing  the  constitutions,  the 
government  then  in  being  were  not  actors  either  way. 


188  EIGHTS   OF  MAN. 

Government  has  no  right  to  make  itself  a  party  in  ant 
debate  respecting  the  principles  or  modes  of  forming,  or  of 
changing  constitutions.  It  is  not  for  the  benefit  of  those 
who  exercise  the  powers  of  government,  that  constitutions, 
and  the  governments  issuing  from  them,  are  established. 
In  all  those  matters,  the  right  of  judging  and  acting  are  in 
those  who  pay,  and  not  in  those  who  receive. 

A  constitution  is  the  property  of  a  nation,  and  not  of 
those  who  exercise  the  government.  All  the  constitutions 
of  America  are  declared  to  be  established  on  the  authority 
of  the  people.  In  France,  the  word  nation  is  used  instead 
of  the  people ;  but  in  both  cases,  a  constitution  is  a  thing 
antecedent  to  the  government,  and  always  distinct  there- 
from. 

In  England,  it  is  not  difficult  to  perceive  that  every  thing 
has  a  constitution,  except  the  nation.  Every  society  ana 
association  that  is  established,  first  agreed  upon  a  number 
of  original  articles,  digested  into  form,  which  are  its  consti- 
tution. It  then  appointed  its  officers,  whose  powers  and 
authorities  are  described  in  that  constitution,  and  the 
government  of  that  society  then  commenced.  Those  officers, 
by  whatever  name  they  are  called,  have  no  authority  to  add 
to,  alter,  or  abridge  the  original  articles.  It  is  only  to  the 
constituting  power  that  this  right  belongs. 

From  the  want  of  understanding  the  difference  between 
a  constitution  and  a  government,  Dr.  Johnson,  and  all 
writers  of  his  description,  have  always  bewildered  them- 
selves. They  could  not  but  perceive,  that  there  must  neces- 
sarily be  a  controlling  power  somewhere,  and  they  placed 
this  power  in  the  discretion  of  the  persons  exercising  the 

fovernment,  instead  of  placing  it  in  a  constitution  formed 
y  the  nation.  When  it  is  in  a  constitution,  it  has  the 
nation  for  its  support,  and  the  natural  and  the  political  con- 
trolling powers  are  together.  The  laws  which  are  enacted 
by  governments,  control  men  only  as  individuals,  but  the 
nation,  through  its  constitution,  controls  the  whole  govern- 
ment, and  has  a  natural  ability  so  to  do.  The  final  con- 
trolling power,  therefore,  and  the  original  constituting  power, 
are  one  and  the  same  power. 

Dr.  Johnson  could  not  have  advanced  such  a  position  in 
any  country  where  there  was  a  constitution ;  and  ne  is  him- 
self an  evidence  that  no  such  thing  as  a  constitution  exists 
in  England.  But  it  may  be  put  as  a  question,  not  improper 
to  be  investigated,  that  if  a  constitution  does  not  exist, 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN.  139 

how  came  the  idea  of  its  existence  BO  generally  esta- 
blished ? 

In  order  to  decide  this  question,  it  is  necessary  to  con- 
sider a  constitution  in  botn  its  cases:  1st,  as  creating  a 
government  and  giving  it  its  powers :  2d,  as  regulating  and 
restraining  the  powers  so  given. 

If  we  begin  with  William  of  Normandy,  we  find  that  the 
government  of  England  was  originally  a  tyranny,  founded 
on  an  invasion  and  conquest  of  the  country.  This  being 
admitted,  it  will  then  appear  that  the  exertion  of  the  nation, 
at  different  periods,  to  abate  that  tyranny,  and  render  it 
less  intolerable,  has  been  credited  for  a  constitution. 

Magna  Charta,  as  it  was  called,  (it  is  now  like  an  al- 
manac of  the  same  date,)  was  no  more  than  compelling  the 
government  to  renounce  a  part  of  its  assumptions.  It  did 
not  create  and  give  powers  to  government  in  the  manner  a 
constitution  does ;  but  was,  as  far  as  it  went,  of  the  nature 
of  a  re-conquest,  and  not  of  a  constitution ;  for,  could  the 
nation  have  totally  expelled  the  usurpation,  as  France  has 
done  its  despotism,  it  would  then  have  had  a  constitution 
to  form. 

The  history  of  the  Edwards  and  the  Henries,  and  up  to 
the  commencement  of  the  Stuarts,  exhibits  as  many  instances 
of  tyranny  as  couH  be  acted  within  the  limits  to  which  the 
nation  had  restricted  it.  The  Stuarts  endeavored  to  pass 
those  limits,  and  their  fate  is  well  known.  In  all  those 
instances  we  see  nothing  of  a  constitution,  but  only  of  re- 
strictions on  assumed  power. 

After  this,  another  William,  descended  from  the  same 
stock,  and  claiming  from  the  same  origin,  gained  possession ; 
and  of  the  two  evils,  James  and  William,  the  nation  pre- 
ferred what  it  thought  the  least ;  since,  from  the  circum- 
stances, it  must  take  one.  The  act,  called  the  Bill  of  Eights, 
comes  here  into  view.  What  is  it  but  a  bargain,  which  the 
parts  of  the  government  made  with  each  other,  to  divide 
power,  profit,  and  privileges?  You  shall  have  so  much, 
and  I  will  have  the  rest ;  and  with  respect  to  the  nation,  it 
said,  for  your  share,  YOU  shall  have  the  right  of  petitioning. 
This  being  the  case,  the  bill  of  rights  is  more  properly  a  bill 
of  wrongs,  and  of  insult.  As  to  what  is  called  the  conven- 
tion-parliament, it  was  a  thing  that  made  itself,  and  then 
made  the  authority  by  which  it  acted.  A  few  person*,  got 
together,  and  called  themselves  by  that  name.  Sw^eraJ  of 


1*0  RIGHTS  OF  MAN. 

them  had  never  been  ejected,  and  none  of  them  for  that 
purpose. 

From  the  time  of  William,  a  species  of  government  arose, 
issuing  out  of  this  coalition  bill  of  rights ;  and  more  so,  since 
the  corruption  introduced  at  the  Hanover  succession,  by  the 
agency  of  Walpole :  that  can  be  described  by  no  other  name 
than  a  despotic  legislation.  Though  the  parts  may  embarrass 
each  other,  the  whole  has  no  bounds ;  and  the  only  right  it 
acknowledges  out  of  itself,  is  the  right  of  petitioning.  Where 
then  is  the  constitution  that  either  gives  or  restrains  power  ? 

It  is  not  because  a  part  of  the  government  is  elective,  that 
makes  it  less  a  despotism,  if  the  persons  so  elected,  possess 
afterwards,  as  a  parliament,  unlimited  powers.  Election,  'n 
this  case,  becomes  separated  from  representation,  and  the 
candidates  are  candidates  for  despotism. 

I  cannot  believe  that  any  nation,  reasoning  on  its  own 
rights,  would  have  thought  of  calling  those  things  a  consti- 
tution^ if  the  cry  of  constitution  had  not  been  set  up  by  the 
government.  It  has  got  into  circulation  like  the  words  bore, 
and  quiz,  by  being  chalked  up  in  speeches  of  parliament,  as 
those  words  were  on  window-shutters  and  door  posts ;  but 
whatever  the  constitution  may  be  in  other  respects,  it  has 
undoubtedly  been  the  most  productive  machinefor  taxation 
that  was  ever  invented.  The  taxes  in  France,  under  the  new 
constitution,  are  not  quite  thirteen  shillings  per  head,*  and 
the  taxes  in  England,  under  what  is  called  its  present  con- 
stitution, are  forty-eight  shillings  and  sixpence  per  head, 
men,  women,  and  children,  amounting  to  nearly  seventeen 
millions  sterling,  besides  the  expense  of  collection,  which  is 
upwards  of  a  million  more. 

In  a  country  like  England,  where  the  whole  of  the  civil 
government  is  executed  by  the  people  of  every  town  and 
county,  by  means  of  parish  officers,  magistrates,  quarterly 
sessions,  juries,  and  assize,  without  any  trouble  to  what  is 
called  government,  or  any  other  expense  to  the  revenue  than 

*  The  whole  amount  of  the  assessed  taxes  of  France,  for  the  present  year,  is 
three  hundred  millions  of  francs,  which  is  twelve  millions  and  a  half  sterling ; 
and  the  incidental  taxes  are  estimated  at  three  millions,  making  in  the  whole 
fifteen  millions  and  a  half;  which  among  twenty-four  millions  of  people,  is 
not  quite  thirteen  shillings  per  head.  France  has  lessened  her  taxes  since  the 
revolution,  nearly  nine  millions  sterling  annually.  Before  the  revolution,  the 
city  of  Paris  paid  a  duty  of  upwards  of  thirty  per  cent,  on  all  articles  brought 
into  the  city.  This  tax  was  collected  at  the  city  gates.  It  was  taken  off  on 
the  first  of  last  May,  and  the  gates  taken  down. 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN.  141 

the  salary  of  the  judges,  it  is  astonishing  how  such  a  maw 
of  taxes  can  be  employed.  Not  even  the  internal  defence 
of  the  country  is  paid  out  of  the  revenue.  On  all  occasions, 
whether  real  or  contrived,  recourse  is  continually  had  tc 
new  loans  and  to  new  taxes.  No  wonder,  then,  that  a  ma- 
chine of  government  so  advantageous  to  the  advocates  of  a 
court,  should  be  so  triumphantly  extolled !  No  wonder  that 
St.  James's  or  St.  Stephen's  should  echo  with  the  continual 
cry  of  constitution !  No  wonder  that  the  French  revolution 
should  be  reprobated,  and  the  res-publica  treated  with  re- 
proach !  The  red  book  of  England,  like  the  red  book  of 
France,  will  explain  the  reason.* 

I  will  now,  by  way  of  relaxation,  turn  a  thought  or 
two  to  Mr.  Burke.  I  ask  his  pardon  for  neglecting  him  so 
long. 

"  America,"  says  he,  (in  his  speech  on  the  Canada  consti- 
tution bill,)  "  never  dreamed  of  such  absurd  doctrine  as  the 
Eights  of  Man." 

Mr.  Burke  is  such  a  bold  presumer,  and  advances  his  as- 
sertions and  premises  with  such  a  deficiency  of  judgment, 
that,  without  troubling  ourselves  about  principles  of  philoso- 
phy or  politics,  the  mere  logical  conclusions  they  produce, 
are  ridiculous.  For  instance : 

If  governments,  as  Mr.  Burke  asserts,  are  not  founded 
on  the  rights  of  man,  and  are  founded  on  any  rights  at  all, 
they  consequently  must  be  founded  on  the  rights  of  some- 
thing that  is  not  mem.  What,  then,  is  that  something  ? 

Generally  speaking,  we  know  of  no  other  creatures  that 
inhabit  the  earth  than  man  and  beast;  and  in  all  cases, 
where  only  two  things  offer  themselves,  and  one  must  be 
admitted,  a  negation  proved  on  any  one,  amounts  to  an  affir- 
mative on  the  other ;  and  therefore,  Mr.  Burke,  by  proving 
against  the  rights  of  man,  proves  in  behalf  of  the  beast  /  ana 
consequently,  proves  that  government  is  a  beast:  and  as 
difficult  things  sometimes  explain  each  other,  we  now  see 
the  origin  of  keeping  wild  beasts  in  the  Tower ;  for  they 
certainly  can  be  of  no  other  use  than  to  show  the  origin  of 
the  government.  They  are  in  the  place  of  a  constitution. 
O  \  John  Bull,  what  honors  thou  hast  lost  by  not  being  a 
wild  beast.  Thou  mightest,  on  Mr.  Burke's  system,  hara 
been  in  the  Tower  for  fife. 


*  What  waa  called  the  livre  rouge,  or  the  red  book,  In  Prance,  was  not  ex- 
actly similar  to  the  court  calendar  in  England ;  but  it  sufficiently  showed  how 
a  great  part  of  the  taxes  were  lavished. 


J49  RIGHTS    OF   MAN. 

If  Mr.  Burke's  arguments  have  not  weight  enough  to  keep 
one  serious,  the  faint  is  less  mine  than  his ;  and  as  I  am 
willing  to  make  an  apology  to  the  reader  for  the  liberty  I 
have  taken,  I  hope  Mr.  Burke  will  also  make  his  for  giving 
the  cause. 

Having  thus  paid  Mr.  Burke  the  compliment  of  remem- 
bering him,  I  return  to  the  subject. 

From  the  want  of  a  constitution  in  England,  to  restrain 
and  regulate  the  wild  impulse  of  power,  many  of  the  laws 
are  irrational  and  tyrannical,  and  the  administration  of  them 
vague  and  problematical. 

The  attention  of  the  government  of  England  (for  I  rathei 
choose  to  call  it  by  this  name,  than  the  English  government) 
appears,  since  its  political  connexion  with  Germany,  to  have 
been  so  completely  engrossed  and  absorbed  by  foreign 
affairs,  and  the  means  of  raising  taxes,  that  it  seems  to  exist 
for  no  other  purposes.  Domestic  concerns  are  neglected; 
and,  with  respect  to  regular  law,  there  is  scarcely  such  a  thing. 

Almost  every  case  must  now  be  determined  by  some  pre- 
cedent, be  that  precedent  good  or  bad,  or  whether  it  properly 
applies  or  not ;  and  the  practice  has  become  so  general,  as 
to  suggest  a  suspicion,  that  it  proceeds  from  a  deeper  policy 
than  at  first  sight  appears. 

Since  the  revolution  of  America,  and  more  so  since  that 
of  France,  this  preaching  up  the  doctrine  of  precedents, 
drawn  from  times  and  circumstances  antecedent  to  those 
events,  has  been  the  studied  practice  of  the  English  govern- 
ment. The  generality  of  those  precedents  are  founded  on 
principles  and  opinions  the  reverse  of  what  they  ought  to 
be ;  and  the  greater  distance  of  time  they  are  drawn  from, 
the  more  they  are  to  be  suspected.  But  by  associating  those 
precedents  with  a  superstitious  reverence  for  ancient  things, 
as  monks  show  relics  and  call  them  holy,  the  generality  of 
mankind  are  deceived  into  the  design.  Governments  now 
act  as  if  they  were  afraid  to  awaken  a  single  reflection  in 
man.  They  are  softly  leading  him  to  the  sepulchre  of  pre- 
cedents, to  deaden  his  faculties  and  call  his  attention  from 
the  scene  of  revolutions.  They  feel  that  he  is  arriving  at 
knowledge  faster  than  they  wish,  and  their  policy  of  prece- 
dents is  the  barometer  of  their  fears.  This  political  popery, 
like  the  ecclesiastical  popery  of  old,  has  had  its  day,  and  is 
hastening  to  its  exit.  The  ragged  relic  and  the  anti- 
quated precedent,  the  monk  and  tne  monarch  will 
together. 


EIGHTS   OF   MAN.  143 

Government  by  precedent,  without  any  regard  to  the 
principle  of  the  precedent,  is  one  of  the  vilest  systems  that 
can  be  set  up.  In  numerous  instances,  the  precedent  ought 
to  operate  as  a  warning,  and  not  as  an  example,  and  requires 
to  be  shunned  instead  of  imitated ;  but  instead  of  this,  pre- 
cedents are  taken  in  the  lump  and  put  at  once  for  constitu- 
tion and  for  law. 

Either  the  doctrine  of  precedent  is  policy  to  keep  a  man 
in  a  state  of  ignorance,  or  it  is  a  practical  confession  that 
wisdom  degenerates  in  governments  as  governments  increase 
in  age,  and  can  only  hobble  along  by  the  stilts  and  crutches 
of  precedents.  How  is  it  that  the  same  persons  who  would 
proudly  be  thought  wiser  than  their  predecessors,  appear  at 
the  same  time  only  as  the  ghosts  of  departed  wisdom  ?  How 
strangely  is  antiquity  treated  1  To  answer  some  purposes,  it 
is  spoken  of  as  the  times  of  darkness  and  ignorance,  and  to 
answer  others  it  is  put  for  the  light  of  the  world. 

If  the  doctrine  of  precedents  is  to  be  followed,  the  expenses 
of  government  need  not  continue  the  same.  Why  pay  men 
extravagantly  who  have  but  little  to  do  ?  If  every  thing  that 
can  happen  is  already  in  precedent,  legislation  is  at  an  end, 
and  precedent,  like  a  dictionary,  determines  every  case. 
Either,  therefore,  government  has  arrived  at  its  dotage,  and 
requires  to  be  renovated,  or  all  the  occasions  for  exercising 
its  wisdom  have  occurred. 

We  now  see  all  over  Europe,  and  particularly  in  England, 
the  curious  phenomenon  of  a  nation  looking  one  way,  and  a 
government  the  other.;  the  one  forward,  and  the  other  back- 
ward. If  governments  are  to  go  on  by  precedent,  while 
nations  go  on  by  improvement,  tney  must  at  last  come  to  a 
final  separation,  and  the  sooner,  and  the  more  civilly  they 
determine  this  point,  the  better  it  will  be  for  them.* 

Having  thus  spoken  of  constitutions  generally,  as  things 
distinct  from  actual  governments,  let  us  proceed  to  consider 
the  parts  of  which  a  constitution  is  composed. 

*  In  England,  the  improvements  in  agriculture,  useful  arts,  manufactures, 
and  commerce,  have  been  made  in  opposition  to  the  genius  of  its  government, 
which  is  that  of  following  precedents.  It  is  from  the  enterprise  and  industry 
of  the  individuals,  and  their  numerous  associations,  in  which,  tritely  speaking, 
government  is  neither  pillow  nor  bolster,  that  these  improvements  have  pro- 
ceeded. No  man  thought  about  the  government,  or  who  was  in,  or  who  was 
out,  when  he  was  planning  or  executing  those  things ;  and  all  he  had  to  hope, 
with  respect  to  government,  was,  that  it  would  let  him  alone.  Three  or  four 
rery  silly  ministerial  newspapers  are  continually  offending  against  the  spirit  of 
national  improvement,  by  ascribing  it  to  a  minister.  They  may  with  as  muca 
iruth.  ascribe  this  book  to  a  minister 


144  BIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

Opinions  differ  more  on  this  subject,  than  with  respect  to 
the  whole.  That  a  nation  ought  to  have  a  constitution,  as 
a  rule  for  the  conduct  of  its  government,  is  a  simple  question 
in  which  all  men,  not  directly  courtiers,  will  agree.  It  is 
only  on  the  component  parts  that  questions  and  opinions 
multiply. 

But  this  difficulty,  like  every  other,  will  dimmish  when  put 
into  a  train  of  being  rightly  understood. 

The  first  thing  is,  that  a  nation  Has  a  right  to  establish  a 
constitution. 

Whether  it  exercises  this  right  in  the  most  judicious  man- 
ner at  first,  is  quite  another  case.  It  exercises  it  agreeably 
to  the  judgment  it  possesses ;  and  by  continuing  to  do  so,  all 
errors  will  at  last  be  exploded. 

When  this  right  is  established  in  a  nation,  there  is  no  fear 
that  it  will  be  employed  to  its  own  injury.  A  nation  can 
have  no  interest  in  being  wrong. 

Though  all  the  constitutions  of  America  are  on  one  gene- 
ral principle,  yet  no  two  of  them  are  exactly  alike  in  their 
component  parts,  or  in  the  distribution  of  the  powers  which 
they  give  to  the  actual  governments.  Some  are  more  and 
others  less  complex. 

In  forming  a  constitution,  it  is  first  necessary  to  consider 
what  are  the  ends  for  which  government  is  necessary: 
secondly,  what  are  the  best  means,  and  the  least  expensive, 
for  accomplishing  those  ends. 

Government  is  nothing  more  than  a  national  association ; 
and  the  object  of  this  association  is  the  good  of  all,  as  well 
individually  as  collectively.  Every  man  wishes  to  pursue 
his  occupation,  and  to  enjoy  the  fruits  of  his  labors,  and  the 
produce  of  his  property,  in  peace  and  safety,  and  with  the 
least  possible  expense.  When  these  things  are  accomplished, 
all  the  objects  for  which  government  ought  to  be  established 
are  answered. 

It  has  been  customary  to  consider  government  under  three' 
distinct  general  heads.  The  legislative,  the  executive,  and 
the  judicial. 

But  if  we  permit  our  judgment  to  act  unencumbered  by 
the  habit  of  multiplied  terms,  we  can  perceive  no  more  than 
two  divisions  of  power,  of  which  civil  government  is  com- 
posed, namely,  that  of  legislating,  or  enacting  laws,  and 
that  of  executing  or  administering  them.  Every  thing, 
therefore,  appertaining  to  civil  government,  classes  itsen 
under  one  or  other  of  these  twc  divisions. 


BIOHT8   OF   MAN.  1-ifi 

So  far  as  regards  the  execution  of  the  laws,  that  which  ia 
called  the  judicial  power,  is  strictly  and  properly  the  exe- 
cutive power  of  every  country.  It  is  that  power  to  which 
every  individual  has  an  appeal,  and  which  causes  the  laws 
to  be  executed ;  neither  have  we  any  other  clear  idea  with 
respect  to  the  official  execution  of  the  laws.  In  England, 
and  also  in  America  and  France,  this  power  begins  with  the 
magistrate,  and  proceeds  up  through  all  the  courts  of  judi- 
cature. 

I  leave  to  courtiers  to  explain  what  is  meant  by  calling 
monarchy  the  executive  power.  It  is  merely  a  name  in 
which  acts  of  government  are  done ;  and  any  other,  or  none 
at  all,  would  answer  the  same  purpose.  Laws  have  neither 
more  nor  less  authority  on  this  account.  It  must  be  from 
the  justness  of  their  principles,  and  the  interest  which  a 
nation  feels  therein,  tnat  they  derive  support ;  if  they  re- 
quire any  other  than  this,  it  is  a  sign  that  something  in  the 
system  of  government  is  imperfect.  Laws  difficult  to  be 
executed  cannot  be  generally  good. 

With  respect  to  the  organization  of  the  legislative  power, 
different  modes  have  been  adopted  in  different  countries. 
In  America  it  is  generally  composed  of  two  houses.  In 
France  it  consists  but  of  one,  but  in  both  countries,  it  is 
wholly  by  representation. 

The  case  is,  that  mankind  (from  the  long  tyranny  of  as- 
sumed power)  have  had  so  few  opportunities  of  making  the 
necessary  trials  on  modes  and  principles  of  government,  in 
order  to  discover  the  best,  that  government  is  but  now  be- 
ginning to  be  known,  and  experience  is  yet  wanting  to  deter- 
mine many  particulars. 

The  objections  against  two  houses  are,  first,  that  there  ia 
an  inconsistency  in  any  part  of  a  whole  legislature,  coming 
to  a  final  determination  by  vote  on  any  matter,  -whilst  that 
matter,  with  respect  to  that  whole,  is  yet  only  in  a  train  of 
deliberation,  and  consequently  open  to  new  illus  orations. 

2d,  That  by  taking  the  vote  on  each,  as  a  separate  bodv, 
it  always  admits  of  the  possibility,  and  is  often  the  case  in 
practice,  that  the  minority  governs  the  majority,  and  that, 
in  some  instances,  to  a  great  degree  of  inconsistency. 

3d,  That  two  houses  arbitrarily  checking  or  controlling 
each  other,  is  inconsistent ;  because  it  cannot  be  proved,  op 
the  principles  of  just  representation,  that  either  should  be 
wiser  or  better  than  the  other.  They  may  check  in  the  wrong 
as  well  as  in  the  right ;  and  therefore,  to  give  the  power 


146  EIGHTS   OF  MAN. 

where  we  cannot  give  the  wisdom  to  use  it,  nor  be  assured 
of  its  being  rightly  used,  renders  the  hazard  at  least  equal 
to  the  precaution.* 

The  objection  against  a  single  house  is,  that  it  is  always  in 
a  condition  of  committing  itself  too  soon.  But  it  should  at 
the  same  time  be  remembered  that  when  there  is  a  constitu- 
tion which  defines  the  power,  and  establishes  the  principles 
within  which  a  legislature  shall  act,  there  is  already  a  more 
effectual  check  provided,  and  more  powerfully  operating, 
than  any  other  check  can  be.  For  example, 

Were  a  bill  to  be  brought  into  any  of  the  American  legis- 
latures, similar  to  that  which  was  passed  into  an  act  by  the 
English  parliament,  at  the  commencement  of  the  reign  of 
George  I.  to  extend  the  duration  of  the  assemblies  to  a  longer 
period  than  they  now  sit,  the  check  is  in  the  constitutionr 
which  in  effect  says,  thus  far  shalt  thou  go  and  no  further. 

But  in  order  to  remove  the  objection  against  a  single  house, 
(that  of  acting  with  too  quick  an  impulse)  and  at  the  same 
time  to  avoid  the  inconsistencies,  in  some  cases  absurdities, 
arising  from  the  twc  houses,  the  following  method  has  been 
proposed  as  an  improvement  on  both. 

1st,  To  have  but  one  representation. 

2d,  To  divide  that  representation,  by  lot,  into  two  or  three 
parts. 

3d,  That  every  proposed  bill  shall  first  be  debated  in  those 
parts,  by  succession,  that  they  may  become  hearers  of  each 
other,  but  without  taking  anv  vote.  After  which  the  whole 
representation  to  assemble,  lor  a  general  debate  and  deter- 
mination, by  vote. 

To  this  proposed  improvement  has  been  added  another, 
for  the  purpose  of  keeping  the  representation  in  a  state  01 
constant  renovation ;  which  is,  that  one  third  of  the  repre- 

*  With  respect  to  the  two  houses,  of  which  the  English  parliament  is  com- 
posed, they  appear  to  be  effectually  influenced  into  one,  and,  as  a  legislature, 
to  have  no  temper  of  its  own.  The  minister,  whoever  he  at  any  time  may  be, 
touches  it  as  with  an  opium  wand,  and  it  sleeps  obedience. 

But  if  we  look  at  the  distinct  abilities  of  the  two  houses,  the  difference  will 
appear  so  great,  as  to  show  the  inconsistency  of  placing  power  where  the"re 
can  be  no  certainty  of  the  judgment  to  use  it.  Wretched  as  the  state  of 
representation  is  in  England,  it  is  manhood  compared  with  what  is  called  the 
house  of  lords ;  and  so  little  is  this  nick-named  house  regarded,  that  the 
people  scarcely  inquire  at  any  time  what  it  is  doing.  It  appears  also  to  be 
most  under  influence,  and  the  furthest  removed  from  the  general  interest  of 
the  nation.  In  the  debate  on  engaging  in  the  Russian  and  Turkish  war,  the 
majority  in  the  house  of  peers  in  favor  of  it  was  upwards  of  ninety,  when  in 
the  other  house,  which  was  more  Limn  double  its  numbers,  the  majority  wa» 
•ixty-three. 


RIGHTS    OF   MAN.  147 

§entation  of  each  country  shall  go  out  at  the  expiration  of 
one  year,  and  the  number  be  replaced  by  new  elections. 
Another  third  at  the  expiration  of  the  second  year,  replaced 
in  like  manner,  and  every  third  year  to  be  a  general 
election.* 

The  proceedings  on  Mr.  Fox's  bill,  respecting  the  rights  of  juries,  merits 
also  to  be  noticed.  The  persons  called  the  peers,  were  not  the  objects  of  that 
bill.  They  are  already  in  possession  of  more  privileges  than  that  bill  gave  to 
others.  They  are  their  own  jury,  and  if  any  one  of  that  house  were  prose- 
cuted for  a  libel,  he  would  not  suffer,  even  upon  conviction,  for  the  first  offence. 
Such  inequality  in  laws  ought  not  to  exist  in  any  country.  The  French  con- 
stitution says,  that  the  law  is  the  same  to  every  individual,  whether  to  protect  or 
to  punish.  All  are  equal  in  its  sight. 

But  in  whatever  manner  the  separate  parts  of  a  constitu- 
tion may  be  arranged,  there  is  one  general  principle  that 
distinguishes  freedom  from  slavery,  which  is,  that  all  heredi- 
tary  government  over  a  people  is  to  them  a  species  of  slavery, 
and  representative  government  is  freedom. 

Considering  government  in  the  only  light  in  which  it 
should  be  considered,  that  of  a  NATIONAL  ASSOCIATION,  it 
ought  to  be  so  constructed  as  not  to  be  disordered  by  any 
accident  happening  among  the  parts ;  and  therefore,  no 
extraordinary  power,  capable  of  producing  such  an  effect, 
should  be  lodged  in  the  hands  of  any  individual.  The 
death,  sickness,  absence,  or  defection  of  any  one  individual 
in  a  government,  ought  to  be  a  matter  of  no  more  conse- 
quence, with  respect  to  the  nation,  than  if  the  same  circum- 
stance had  taken  place  in  a  member  of  the  English  parliament, 
or  the  French  national  assembly. 

Scarcely  any  thing  presents  a  more  degrading  character 
of  national  greatness,  than  its  being  thrown  into  confusion 
by  any  thing  happening  to,  or  acted  by  an  individual ;  and 
the  ridiculousness  of  the  scene  is  often  increased  by  the 
natural  insignificance  of  the  person  by  whom  it  is  occasioned. 
Were  a  government  so  constructed,  that  it  could  not  go  on 
unless  a  goose  or  a  gander  were  present  in  the  senate,  the 
difficulties  would  be  just  as  great  and  as  real  on  the  flight  or 
sickness  of  the  goose  or  the  gander,  as  if  they  were  called  a 
king.  We  laugh  at  individuals  for  the  silly  difficulties  they 

*  As  to  the  state  of  representation  in  England,  it  is  too  absurd  to  be  reasoned 
upon.  Almost  all  the  represented  parts  are  decreasing  in  population,  and  the 
unrepresented  parts  are  increasing.  A  general  convention  of  the  nation  u 
ary  to  takn  the  whole  state  of  its  government  into  consideration 


148  EIGHTS   OF   MAN 

make  to  themselves,  without  perceiving  that  the  greatest  rf 
all  rioliculous  things  are  acted  in  governments.* 

All  the  constitutions  of  America  are  on  a  plan  that  excludes 
the  childish  embarrassments  which  occur  in  monarchical 
countries.  No  suspension  of  government  can  there  take 
place  for  a  moment,  from  any  circumstance  whatever.  The 
system  of  representation  provides  for  every  thing,  and  is  the 
only  system  in  which  nations  and  governments  can  always 
appear  in  their  proper  character. 

As  extraordinary  power  ought  not  to  be  lodged  in  the 
hands  of  any  individual,  so  ought  there  to  be  no  appropria- 
tions of  public  money  to  any  person  beyond  what  his 
services  in  a  state  may  be  worth.  It  signifies  not  whether 
a  man  be  called  a  president,  a  king,  an  emperor,  a  senator, 
or  by  any  other  name,  which  propriety  or  folly  may  devise, 
or  arrogance  assume ;  it  is  only  a  certain  service  he  can 
perform  in  the  state ;  and  the  service  of  any  such  individual 
in  the  routine  of  office,  whether  such  office  be  called  mon- 
archical, presidential,  senatorial,  or  by  any  other  name  or 
title,  can  never  exceed  the  value  of  ten  thousand  pounds 
a-year.  All  the  great  services  that  are  done  in  the  world 
are  performed  by  volunteer  characters,  who  accept  no  pay 
for  them ;  but  the  routine  of  office  is  always  regulated  to 
such  a  general  standard  of  abilities  as  to  be  within  the  com- 
pass of  numbers  in  every  country  to  perform,  and  therefore 
cannot  merit  very  extraordinary  recompense.  Government, 
says  Swift,  is  a  plain  thing,  and  fitted  to  the  capacity  of 
many  heads. 

It  is  inhuman  to  talk  of  a  million  sterling  a-year,  paid  out 
of  the  public  taxes  of  any  country,  for  the  support  of  any 
individual,  whilst  thousands,  who  are  forced  to  contribute 

*  It  is  related,  that  in  the  canton  of  Berne,  in  Switzerland,  it  had  been  cus- 
tomary, from  time  immemorial,  to  keep  a  bear  at  the  public  expense,  and  the 
people  had  been  taught  to  believe,  that  if  they  had  not  a  bear,  they  should  all 
be  undone.  It  happened  some  years  ago,  that  the  bear,  then  in  being,  was 
taken  sick,  and  died  too  suddenly  to  have  his  place  immediately  supplied  with 
arother.  During  the  interregnum  the  people  discovered,  that  the  corn  grew 
and  the  vintage  flourished,  and  the  sun  and  moon  continued  to  rise  and  set, 
and  every  thing  went  on  the  same  as  before,  and,  taking  courage  from  these 
circumstances,  they  resolved  not  to  keep  any  more  bears :  for,  said  they,  "  a 
bear  is  a  very  voracious,  expensive  animal,  and  we  were  obliged  to  pull  out  hia 
claws,  lest  he  should  hurt  the  citizens." 

The  story  of  the  bear  of  Berne  was  related  in  some  of  the  French  newspa- 
pers, at  the  time  of  the  flight  of  Louis  XVI.  and  the  application  of  it  to  mon- 
archy could  not  be  mistaken  in  France  ;  but  it  seems,  that  the  aristocracy  of 
Berne  applied  it  to  themselves,  and  have  since  prohibited  the  reading  of  French 
newspapers.  , 


BIGHTS   OF   XA9.  149 

thereto,  are  pining  with  want,  and  struggling  with  misery 
Government  does  not  consist  in  a  contrast  between  prison* 
and  palaces,  between  poverty  and  pomp ;  it  is  not  instituted 
to  rob  the  needy  of  his  mite,  and  increase  the  wretchedness 
of  the  wretched. — But  of  this  part  of  the  subject  I  shall 
speak  hereafter,  and  confine  myself  at  present  to  political 
observations. 

When  extraordinary  power  and  extraordinary  pay  are 
allotted  to  any  individual  in  a  government,  he  becomes  the 
centre,  round  which  every  kind  of  corruption  generates  and 
forms.  Give  to  any  man  a  million  a  year,  and  add  thereto 
the  power  of  creating  and  disposing  of  places,  at  the  expense 
of  a  country,  and  the  liberties  of  that  country  are  no  longer 
secure.  Wnat  is  called  the  splendor  of  a  throne,  is  no  othei 
than  the  corruption  of  th£  state.  It  is  made  up  of  a  band 
of  parasites,  living  in  luxurious  indolence,  out  of  the  public 
taxes. 

When  once  such  a  vicious  system  is  established,  it  becomes 
the  guard  and  protection  of  all  inferior  abuses.  The  man 
who  is  in  the  receipt  of  a  million  a-year  is  the  last  person  to 
promote  a  spirit  of  reform,  lest,  in  the  event,  it  should  reach 
to  himself.  It  is  always  his  interest  to  defend  inferior  abuses, 
as  so  many  outworks  to  protect  the  citadel ;  and  in  this 
species  of  political  fortification,  all  the  parts  have  such  a 
common  dependance,  that  it  is  never  to  be  expected  they 
will  attack  each  other.* 

*  It  is  scarcely  possible  to  touch  on  any  subject,  that  will  not  suggest  an 
allusion  to  some  corruption  in  governments.  The  simile  of  "fortifications" 
unfortunately  involves  with  it  a  circumstance,  which  is  directly  in  point  with 
the  matter  above  alluded  to. 

Among  the  numerous  instances  of  abuse  which  have  been  acted  or  pro- 
tected by  governments,  ancient  or  modern,  there  is  not  a  greater  than  that 
of  quartering  a  man  and  his  heirs  upon  the  public,  to  be  maintained  at  its 
expense. 

Humanity  dictates  a  provision  for  the  poor — but  by  what  right,  moral  or 
political,  does  any  government  assume  to  say,  that  the  person  called  the  Duke 
of  Richmond,  shall  be  maintained  by  the  public  ?  Yet,  if  common  report  is 
true,  not  a  beggar  in  London  can  purchase  hia  wretched  pittance  of  coal, 
without  paying  towards  the  civil  list  of  the  Duke  of  Richmond.  Were  the 
whole  produce  of  this  imposition  but  a  shilling  a-year,  the  iniquitous  principle 
would  be  still  the  same — but  when  it  amounts,  as  it  is  said  to  do,  to  not  less 
than  twenty  thousand  pounds  per  anu.,  the  enormity  is  too  serious  to  be  per- 
mitted to  remain. — This  is  one  of  the  effects  of  monarchy  and  aristocracy. 

In  stating  this  case,  I  am  led  by  no  personal  dislike.  Though  I  think  it 
mean  in  any  man  to  live  upon  the  public ;  the  vice  originates  in  the  govern- 
ment ;  and  so  general  is  it  become,  that  whether  the  parties  are  in  the  minis- 
try or  in  the  opposition,  it  makes  no  difference,  they  are  sure  of  the  guaranty 
of  each  other. 


150  RIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

Monarchy  would  not  have  continued  so  many  ages  in  the 
world  had  it  not  been  for  the  abuses  it  protects.  It  is  the 
master  fraud,  which  shelters  all  others.  By  admitting  a 
participation  of  the  spoil,  it  makes  itself  friends  ;  and  when 
it  ceases  to  do  this,  it  will  cease  to  be  the  idol  of  courtiers. 

As  the  principle  on  which  constitutions  are  now  formed, 
rejects  all  hereditary  pretensions  to  government,  it  also 
rejects  all  that  catalogue  of  assumptions  known  by  the  name 
of  prerogatives. 

K  there  is  any  government  where  prerogatives  might 
with  apparent  safety  be  intrusted  to  any  individual,  it  is  in 
the  federal  government  of  America.  The  president  of  the 
United  States  of  America  is  elected  only  for  four  years. 
He  is  not  only  responsible  in  the  general  sense  of  the  word, 
but  a  particular  mode  is  laid  down  in  the  constitution  for 
trying  him.  He  cannot  be  elected  under  thirty-five  years  of 
age ;  and  he  must  be  a  native  of  the  country. 

In  a  comparison  of  these  cases  with  the  government  of 
England,  the  difference  when  applied  to  the  latter  amounts 
to  an  absurdity.  In  England,  the  person  who  exercises  this 
prerogative  is  often  a  foreigner;  always  half  a  foreigner, 
and  always  married  to  a  foreigner.  He  is  never  in  full 
natural  or  political  connexion  with  the  country,  is  not  res- 
.ponsible  for  any  thing,  and  becomes  of  age  at  eighteen 
years ;  yet  such  a  person  is  permitted  to  form  foreign  alli- 
ances, without  even  the  knowledge  of  the  nation ;  and  to 
make  war  and  peace  without  its  consent. 

But  this  is  not  all.  Though  such  a  person  cannot  dispose 
of  the  government,  in  the  manner  of  a  testator,  he  dictates 
the  marriage  connexions,  which,  in  effect,  accomplishes  a 
great  part  of  the  same  end.  He  cannot  directly  bequeath 
half  the  government  to  Prussia,  but  he  can  form  a  marriage 
partnership  that  will  produce  the  same  effect.  Under  such 
circumstances,  it  is  happy  for  England  that  she  is  not  situ- 
ated on  the  continent,  or  she  might,  like  Holland,  fall  under 
the  dictatorship  of  Prussia.  Holland,  by  marriage,  is  a« 
effectually  governed  by  Prussia,  as  if  the  old  tyranny  of  b??- 
queathing  the  government  had  been  the  means. 

The  presidency  in  America,  (or,  as  it  is  sometimes  called, 
the  executive,)  is  the  only  office  from  which  a  foreigner  is 
excluded ;  and  in  England,  it  is  the  only  one  to  which  he  is 
admitted.  A  foreigner  cannot  be  a  member  of  parliament 
but  he  may  be  what  is  called  a  king.  If  there  is  any  reason 
for  excluding  foreigners,  it  ought  to  'be  from  those  offices 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN.  151 

where  most  mischief  can  be  acted,  and  where,  by  uniting 
every  bias  of  interest  and  attachment,  the  trust  is  best 
secured. 

But  as  nations  proceed  in  the  great  business  of  forming 
constitutions,  they  will  examine  with  more  precision  into  the 
nature  and  business  of  that  department  which  is  called  the 
executive.  What  the  legislative  and  judicial  departments 
are,  every  one  can  see ;  but  with  respect  to  what,  in  Europe, 
is  called  the  executive,  as  distinct  from  those  two,  it  is  either 
a  political  superfluity,  or  a  chaos  of  unknown  things. 

Some  kind  of  official  department,  to  which  reports  shall  be 
made  from  different  parts  of  the  nation,  or  from  abroad,  to 
be  laid  before  the  national  representatives,  is  all  that  is 
necessary ;  but  there  is  n,p  consistency  in  calling  this  the 
executive ;  neither  can  it  \>e  considered  in  any  other  light 
than  as  inferior  to  the  legislature.  The  sovereign  authority 
in  any  country  is  the  power  of  making  laws,  and  every  thing 
else  is  an  official  department. 

Next  to  the  arrangement  of  the  principles  and  the  organi- 
zation of  the  several  parts  of  a  constitution,  is  the  provision 
to  be  made  for  the  support  of  the  persons  to  whom  the  nation 
shall  confide  the  administration  of  the  constitutional  powers. 

A  nation  can  have  no  right  to  the  time  and  services  of  any 
person  at  his  own  expense,  whom  it  may  choose  to  employ 
or  intrust  in  any  department  whatever ;  neither  can  any 
reason  be  given  for  making  provision  for  the  support  of  any 
one  part  of  the  government  and  not  for  the  other. 

But,  admitting  that  the  honor  of  being  intrusted  with  any 
part  of  a  government,  is  to  be  considered  a  sufficient  rewara, 
it  ought  to  be  so  to  every  person  alike.  If  the  members  01 
the  legislature  of  any  country  are  to  serve  at  their  own 
expense,  that  which  is  called  the  executive,  whether  mon- 
archical, or  by  any  other  name,  ought  to  serve  in  like  manner. 
It  is  inconsistent  to  pay  the  one,  and  accept  the  service  of  the 
other  gratis. 

In  America,  every  department  in  the  government  is 
decently  provided  for ;  but  no  one  is  extravagantly  paid. 
Every  member  of  congress,  and  of  the  state  assemblies,  is 
allowed  a  sufficiency  for  his  expenses.  Whereas,  in  England, 
a  most  prodigal  provision  is  made  for  the  support  of  one 
part  of  the  government,  and  none  for  the  other  ;  the  con- 
sequence of  which  is,  that  the  dne  is  furnished  with  the 
means  of  corruption,  and  the  other  is  put  into  the  condition 
of  being  corrupted.  Less  than  a  fo-rtn  part  of  such  expense, 


152  RIGHTS    OF   MAN. 

applied  as  it  is  in  America,  would  remedy  a  great  part  of  the 
corruption. 

Another  reform  in  the  American  constitutions  Is,  the  ex- 
ploding all  oaths  of  personality.  The  oath  of  allegiance  is 
to  the  nation  only.  The  putting  any  individual  as  a  figure 
for  a  nation  is  improper.  The  happiness  of  a  nation  is  the 
first  object,  and  therefore  the  intention  of  an  oath  of  allegi- 
ance ought  not  to  be  obscured  by  being  figuratively  taken, 
to,  or  in  the  name  of,  any  person.  The  oath,  called  the  civic 
oath,  in  France,  viz.  the  " nation,  the  law,  and  the  king" 
is  improper.  If  taken  at  all,  it  ought  to  be  as  in  America, 
to  the  nation  only.  The  law  may  or  may  not  be  good  ;  but, 
in  this  place,  it  can  have  no  other  meaning,  than  as  being 
conducive  to  the  happiness  of  the  nation,  and  therefore  is 
included  in  it.  The  remainder  of  the  oath  is  improper,  on 
the  ground  that  all  personal  oaths  ought  to  be  abolished. 
They  are  the  remains  of  tyranny  on  one  part,  and  slavery  on 
the  other;  and  the  name  of  the  Creator  ought  not  to  be  in- 
troduced to  witness  the  degradation  of  his  creation ;  or  if 
taken,  as  is  already  mentioned,  as  figurative  of  the  nation,  it 
is  in  this  place  redundant.  But  whatever  apology  may  be 
made  for  oaths  at  the  first  establishment  of  a  government, 
they  ought  not  to  be  permitted  afterwards.  If  a  government 
requires  the  support  of  oaths,  it  is  a  sign  that  it  is  not  worth 
supporting,  and  ought  not  to  be  supported.  Make  govern- 
ment what  it  ought  to  be,  and  it  will  support  itself. 

To  conclude  this  part  of  the  subject.  One  of  the  greatest 
improvements  that  has  been  made  for  the  perpetual  security 
and  progress  of  constitutional  liberty  is  the  provision  which 
the  new  constitutions  make  for  occasionally  revising,  alter- 
ing and  amending  them. 

The  principle  upon  which  Mr.  Burke  formed  his  political 
creed,  that  "  of  binding  and  controlling  posterity  to  the  end 
of  time,  and  renouncing  and  abdicating  the  rights  of  aU 
posterity  for  ever,"  is  now  become  too  detestable  to  be  made 
a  subject  of  debate ;  and,  therefore,  I  pass  it  over  with  no 
other  notice  than  exposing  it. 

Government  is  but  now  beginning  to  be  known.  Hitherto 
it  has  been  the  mere  exercise  of  power,  which  forbade  all 
effectual  inquiry  into  rights,  and,.J*rounded  itself  wholly  on 
possession.  While  the  enemy  or  liberty  was  its  judge,  the 
progress  of  its  principles  must  have  been  small  indeed. 

The  constitutions  of  America,  and  also  that  of  France, 
have  either  fixed  a  period  for  their  revision,  or  laid  dowL 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN. 


the  mode  by  which  improvements  shall  be  made.  It  is  per- 
haps impossible  to  establish  anjr  thing  that  combines  prin- 
ciples with  opinions  and  practice,  which  the  progiess  of 
circumstances,  through  a  length  of  years,  will  not  in  some 
measure  derange,  or  render  inconsistent  ;  and,  therefore,  to 
prevent  inconveniences  accumulating,  till  they  discourage 
reformations  or  provoke  revolutions,  it  is  best  to  regulate 
them  as  they  occur.  The  rights  of  man  are  the  rights  of  all 
generations  of  men,  and  cannot  be  monopolized  by  any. 
That  which  is  worth  following,  will  be  followed  for  the  sake 
of  its  worth  ;  and  it  is  in  this  that  its  security  lies,  and  not 
in  any  conditions  with  which  it  may  be  incumbered.  When 
a  man  leaves  property  to  his  heirs,  he  does  not  connect  it 
with  an  obligation  that  they  shall  accept  it.  Why  then 
should  we  do  otherwise  with  respect  to  constitutions  ? 

The  best  constitution  that  could  now  be  devised,  consis- 
tent with  the  condition  of  the  present  moment,  may  be  far 
short  of  that  excellence  which  a  few  years  may  afford. 
There  is  a  morning  of  reason  rising  upon  man,  on  the  sub- 
ject of  government,  that  has  not  appeared  before.  As  the 
"barbarism  of  the  present  old  governments  expires,  the  mor&l 
condition  of  nations,  with  respect  to  each  other,  will  be 
changed.  Man  will  not  be  brought  up  with  the  savage 
idea  of  considering  his  species  as  enemies,  because  the  acci- 
dent of  birth  gave  the  individuals  existence  in  countries 
distinguished  by  different  names  ;  and  as  constitutions  have 
always  some  relation  to  external  as  well  as  to  domestic  cir- 
cumstances, the  means  of  benefiting  by  every  change,  for- 
eign or  domestic,  should  be  a  part  of  every  constitution. 

We  already  see  an  alteration  in  the  national  disposition 
of  England  and  France  towards  each  other,  which,  when 
we  loot  back  only  a  few  years,  is  itself  a  revolution.  Who 
could  have  foreseen,  or  who  would  have  believed,  that  a 
French  national  assembly  would  ever  have  been  a  popular 
toast  in  England,  or  that  a  friendly  alliance  of  the  two 
nations  should  become  the  wish  of  either  ?  It  shows,  that 
man,  were  he  not  corrupted  by  governments,  is  naturally 
the  friend  of  man,  and  that  human  nature  is  not  of  itself 
vicious.  That  spirit  of  jealousy  and  ferocity,  which  the 
governments  of  tne  two  countries  inspired,  and  which  they 
rendered  subservient  to  the  purpose  of  taxation,  is  now 
yielding  to  the  dictates  of  reason,  interest,  and  humanity. 
The  trade  of  courts  is  beginning  to  be  understood,  and  the 
affectation  of  mystery,  with  p'1  the  artificial  sorcery  by 


154  BIGHTS   OF  MAN. 

which  they  imposed  upon  mankind,  is  on  the  decline.  It 
has  received  its  death  wound ;  and  though  it  may  linger,  it 
will  expire. 

Government  ought  to  be  as  much  open  to  improvement 
as  any  thing  which  appertains  to  man,  instead  01  which  it 
has  been  monopolized  from  age  to  age,  by  the  most  ignorant 
and  vicious  of  the  human  race.  Need  we  any  other  proof 
of  their  wretched  management,  than  the  excess  of  debt  and 
taxes  with  which  every  nation  groans,  and  the  quarrels  into 
which  they  have  precipitated  the  world  ? 

Just  emerging  from  such  a  barbarous  condition,  it  is  too 
soon  to  determine  to  what  extent  of  improvement  govern- 
ment may  yet  be  carried.  For  what  we  can  foresee,  all 
Europe  may  form  but  one  grand  republic,  and  man  be  free 
of  the  whole. 


CHAPTEK  V. 

WATS   AND   MEANS    OF   IMPROVING   THE   CONDITION   OF  EUEOPB 
INTERSPERSED  WITH  MISCELLANEOUS  OBSERVATIONS. 

IN  contemplating  a  subject  that  embraces  with  equatoria* 
magnitude  the  whole  region  of  humanity,  it  is  impossible  to 
confine  the  pursuit  in  any  one  single  direction.  It  takes 
ground  on  every  character  and  condition  that  appertains  to 
man,  and  blends  the  individual,  the  nation,  and  the  world. 

From  a  small  spark,  kindled  in  America,  a  flame  has  arisen, 
not  to  be  extinguished.  "Without  consuming,  like  the  ultimo 
ratio- regum,  it  winds  its  progress  from  nation  to  nation,  and 
conquerB  by  a  silent  operation.  Man  finds  himself  changed, 
he  scar3ely  perceives  how.  He  acquires  a  knowledge  of  his 
rights  by  attending  justly  to  his  interest,  and  discovers  in 
the  event,  that  the  strength  and  powers  of  despotism  consist 
wholly  in  the  fear  of  resisting  it,  and  that,  in  order  "  to  be  free, 
it  is  sufficient  that  he  wills  it" 

Having  in  all  the  preceding  parts  of  this  work  endeavored 
to  establish  a  system  of  principles  as  a  basis  on  which  gov- 
ernments ought  to  be  erected,  I  shall  proceed  in  this,  to  the 
ways  and  means  of  rendering  them  into  practice.  But  in 
order  to  introduce  this  part  of  the  subject, with  more  propriety 


EIGHTS   OF   MAN  155 

and  stronger  effect,  some  preliminary  observations,  deducible 
from,  or  connected  with  those  principles,  are  necessary. 

Whatever  the  form  or  constitution  of  government  may  be, 
it  ought  to  have  no  other  object  than  the  general  happiness. 
When,  instead  of  this,  it  operates  to  create  and  increase 
wretchedness  in  any  of  the  parts  of  society,  it  is  on  a  wrong 
system,  and  reformation  is  necessary. 

Customary  language  has  classed  the  condition  of  man 
under  the  two  descriptions  of  civilized  and  uncivilized  life. 
To  the  one  it  has  ascribed  felicity  and  affluence ;  to  the 
other,  hardship  and  want.  But,  however  our  imagination 
may  be  impressed  by  painting  and  comparison,  it  is  never- 
theless true,  that  a  great  portion  of  mankind,  in  what  are 
called  civilized  countries,  are  in  a  state  of  poverty  and 
wretchedness,  far  below  the  condition  of  an  Indian.  I  speak 
not  of  one  country,  but  of  all.  It  is  so  in  England,  it  is  so 
all  over  Europe.  Let  us  inquire  into  the  cause. 

It  lies  not  in  any  natural  defect  in  the  principles  of  civili- 
zation, but  in  preventing  those  principles  having  an  univer- 
sal operation ;  the  consequence  of  which  is,  a  perpetual  sys- 
tem of  war  and  expense,  that  drains  the  country  and  defeats 
the  general  felicity  of  which  civilization  is  capable. 

All  the  European  governments  (France  now  excepted,) 
are  constructed,  not  on  the  principle  of  universal  civilization, 
but  on  the  reverse  of  it.  So  far  as  those  governments  relate 
to  each  other,  they  are  in  the  same  condition  as  we  conceive 
of  savage  uncivilized  life ;  they  put  themselves  beyond  the 
law,  as  well  of  God  as  of  man,  and  are,  with  respect  to 
principle  and  reciprocal  conduct,  like  so  many  individuals  in 
a  state  of  nature. 

The  inhabitants  of  every  country,  under  the  civilization 
of  laws,  easily  associate  together ;  but  governments  being  in 
an  uncivilized  state,  and  almost  continually  at  war,  they 
pervert  the  abundance  which  civilized  life  produces,  to  carry 
on  the  uncivilized  part  to  a  greater  extent.  By  thus  ingraft- 
ing the  barbarism  of  government  upon  the  internal  civiliza- 
tion of  a  country,  it  draws  from  the  latter,  and  more  espe- 
cially from  the  poor,  a  great  portion  of  those  earnings  which 
should  be  applied  to  their  subsistence  and  comfort.  Apart 
from  all  reflections  of  morality  and  philosophy,  it  is  a 
melancholy  fact,  that  more  than  one  fourth  of  the  labor 
of  mankind  is  annually  consumed  by  this  barbarous  sys- 
tem. 

What  lias  served  to  continue  this  evil,  is  the  pecuniary 


158  BIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

advantage,  which  all  the  governments  of  Europe  have  found 
in  keeping  up  this  state  of  uncivilization.  It  affords  to  them 
pretences  for  power  and  revenue,  for  which  there  would  be 
neither  occasion  nor  apology,  if  the  circle  of  civilization 
were  rendered  complete.  Civil  government  alone,  or  the 
government  of  laws,  is  not  productive  of  pretences  for  many 
taxes ;  it  operates  at  home,  directly  under  the  eye  of  the 
country,  and  precludes  the  possibility  of  much  imposition. 
But  when  the  scene  is  laid  on  the  uncivilized  contention  of 
governments,  the  field  of  pretences  is  enlarged,  and  the 
country,  being  no  longer  a  judge,  is  open  to  every  imposition 
which  governments  please  to  act. 

!Nbt  a  thirtieth,  scarcely  a  fortieth  part  of  the  taxes  which 
are  raised  in  England,  are  either  occasioned  by,  or  applied 
to  the  purposes  of  civil  government.  It  is  not  difficult  to 
see  that  the  whole  which  the  actual  government  does  in  this 
respect,  is  to  enact  laws,  and  that  the  country  administers 
and  executes  them,  at  its  own  expense,  by  means  of  magis- 
trates, juries,  sessions,  and  assize,  over  and  above  the  taxes 
which  it  pays. 

In  this  view  of  the  case,  we  have  two  distinct  characters 
of  government ;  the  one,  the  civil  government,  or  the  gov- 
ernment of  laws,  which  operates  at  home;  the  other,  the 
court  or  cabinet  government,  which  operates  abroad  on  the 
rude  plan  of  uncivilized  life ;  the  one  attended  with  little 
charge,  the  other  with  boundless  extravagance ;  and  so  dis- 
tinct are  the  two,  that  if  the  latter  were  to  sink,  as  it  were 
by  a  sudden  opening  of  the  earth,  and  totally  disappear,  the 
former  would  not  be  deranged.  It  would  still  proceed,  be- 
cause it  is  the  common  interest  of  the  nation  that  it  should, 
and  all  the  means  are  in  practice. 

Revolutions,  then,  have  for  their  object,  a  change  in  the 
moral  condition  of  governments,  and  with  this  change  the 
burden  of  public  taxes  will  lessen,  and  civilization  will  be 
left  to  the  enjoyment  of  that  abundance,  of  which  it  is  now 
deprived. 

In  contemplating  the  whole  of  this  subject,  I  extend  my 
views  into  the  department  of  commerce.  In  all  my  publica- 
tions, where  the  matter  would  admit,  I  have  been  an  advo- 
cate for  commerce,  because  I  am  a  friend  to  its  effects.  It 
is  a  pacific  system,  operating  to  unite  mankind,  by  render- 
ing nations,  as  well  as  individuals,  useful  to  each  other.  Aa 
to  mere  theoretical  reformation,  I  have  never  preached  it  up. 
The  most  effectual  process  is  that  of  improving  the  condition 


RIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

of  man  by  means  of  his  interest ;  and  it  is  on  this  ground 
that  I  tike  my  stand. 

if  commerce  were  permitted  to  act  to  the  universal  extent 
it  is  capable  of,  it  would  extirpate  the  system  of  war,  and 
produce  a  revolution  in  the  uncivilized  state  of  governments. 
The  invention  of  commerce  has  arisen  since  those  govern- 
ments began,  and  is  the  greatest  approach  towards  universal 
civilization,  that  has  yet  been  made  by  any  means  not  im- 
mediately flowing  from  moral  principles. 

Whatever  has  a  tendency  to  promote  the  civil  intercourse 
of  nations,  by  an  exchange  of  benefits,  is  a  subject  as  worthy 
of  philosophy  as  of  politics.  Commerce  is  no  other  than  the 
traffic  of  two  persons,  multiplied  on  a  scale  of  numbers ;  and 
by  the  same  rule  that  nature  intended  the  intercourse  of 
two,  she  intended  that  of  all.  For  this  purpose  she  has  dis- 
tributed the  materials  of  manufactures  and  commerce,  in 
various  and  distant  parts  of  a  nation  and  of  the  world ;  and 
as  they  cannot  be  procured  by  war  so  cheaply  or  so  commo- 
diously  as  by  commerce,  she  has  rendered  the  latter  the 
means  of  extirpating  the  former. 

As  the  two  are  nearly  the  opposites  of  each  other,  conse- 
quently, the  uncivilized  state  of  European  governments  is 
injurious  to  commerce.  Every  kind  of  destruction  or  embar- 
rassment serves  to  lessen  the  quantity,  and  it  matters  but 
little  in  what  part  of  the  commercial  world  the  reduction 
begins.  Like  blood,  it  cannot  be  taken  from  any  of  the 
parts,  without  being  taken  from  the  whole  mass  in  circulation, 
and  all  partake  of  the  loss.  When  the  ability  in  any  nation 
to  buy  is  destroyed,  it  equally  involves  the  seller.  Could 
the  government  of  England  destroy  the  commerce  of  all 
other  nations,  she  would  most  effectually  ruin  her  own. 

It  is  possible  that  a  nation  may  be  the  carrier  for  the 
world,  but  she  cannot  be  the  merchant.  She  cannot  be  the 
seller  and  the  buyer  of  her  own  merchandize.  The  ability 
to  buy  must  reside  out  of  herself;  and,  therefore,  the  pros- 
perity of  any  commercial  nation  is  regulated  by  the  pros- 
perity of  the  rest.  If  they  are  poor,  she  cannot  be  rich ;  and 
ner  condition,  be  it  what  it  may,  is  an  index  of  the  height 
of  the  commercial  tide  in  other  nations. 

That  the  principles  of  commerce,  and  its  universal  opera- 
tion may  be  understood,  without  understanding  the  practice, 
is  a  position  that  reason  will  not  deny :  and  it  is  on  this 
ground  only  that  I  argue  the  subject.  It  is  one  thing  in 
the  counting-house,  in  the  world  it  is  another.  With  re- 


158  RIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

spect  to  its  operation,  it  must  necessarily  be  contemplated 
as  a  reciprocal  thing,  that  only  one  half  its  powers  resides 
within  the  nation,  and  that  the  whole  is  as  effectually  de- 
stroyed by  destroying  the  half  that  resides  without,  as  if  the 
destruction  had  been  committed  on  that  which  is  within,  for 
neither  can  act  without  the  other. 

"When  in  the  last,  as  well  as  in  the  former  wars,  the  com 
merce  of  England  sunk,  it  was  because  the  general  quantity 
was  lessened  everywhere ;  and  it  now  rises  because  com- 
merce is  in  a  rising  state  in  every  nation.  If  England,  at 
this  day,  imports  and  exports  more  than  at  any  other  period, 
the  nations  with  which  she  trades  must  necessarily  do  the 
same ;  her  imports  are  their  exports,  and  vice  versa. 

There  can  be  no  such  thing  as  a  nation  flourishing  alone 
in  commerce  ;  she  can  only  participate ;  and  the  destruction 
of  it  in  any  part  must  necessarily  affect  all.  When,  there- 
fore, governments  are  at  war,  the  attack  is  made  upon  the 
common  stock  of  commerce,  and  the  consequence  is  the 
same  as  if  each  had  attacked  his  own. 

The  present  increase  of  commerce  is  not  to  be  attributed 
to  ministers,  or  to  any  political  contrivances,  but  to  its  own 
natural  operations  in  consequence  of  peace.  The  regular 
markets  had  been  destroyed,  the  channels  of  trade  broken 
up,  and  the  high  road  of  the  seas  infested  with  robbers  of 
every  nation,  and  the  attention  of  the  world  called  to  other 
objects.  Those  interruptions  have  ceased,  and  peace  has 
restored  the  deranged  condition  of  things  to  their  proper 
order.* 

It  is  worth  remarking,  that  every  nation  reckons  the 
balance  of  trade  in  its  own  favor ;  and  therefore  something 
must  be  irregular  in  the  common  ideas  upon  this  subject. 

The  fact,  however  is  true,  according  to  what  is  called  a 
balance  ;  and  it  is  from  this  cause  that  commerce  is  univer- 
sally supported.  Every  nation  feels  the  advantage,  or  it 
would  abandon  the  practice  :  but  the  deception  lies  in  the 
mode  of  making  up  the  accounts,  and  attributing  what  are 
called  profits  to  a  wrong  cause. 

*  In  America  the  increase  of  commerce  is  greater  in  proportion  than  in 
England.  It  is,  at  this  time,  at  least  one  half  more  than  at  any  period  prior  to 
the  revolution.  The  greatest  number  of  vessels  cleared  out  of  the  port  of 
Philadelphia,  before  the  commencement  of  the  war,  was  between  eight  and 
nine  hundred.  In  the  year  1788,  the  number  was  upwards  of  twelve  hundred. 
As  the  state  of  Pennsylvania  is  estimated  as  an  eighth  part  of  the  United 
States  in  population,  the  whole  number  of  vessels  must  now  be  nearly  ten 
thousand. 


BIGHTS   OF   MAST.  159 

Mr.  Pitt  has  sometimes  amused  himself,  by  sb  owing  what 
lie  called  a  balance  of  trade  from  the  custom-!  ouse  oooks. 
This  mode  of  calculation,  not  only  affords  no  rule  that  ia 
true,  but  one  that  is  false. 

In  the  first  place,  every  cargo  that  departs  from  the 
custom-house,  appears  on  the  Docks  as  an  export ;  and 
according  to  the  custom-house  balance,  the  losses  at  sea,  and 
by  foreign  failures,  are  all  reckoned  on  the  side  of  the  profit, 
because  they  appear  as  exports. 

Second,  Because  the  importation  by  the  smuggling  trade 
does  not  appear  on  the  custom-house  books,  to  arrange 
against  the  exports. 

No  balance,  therefore,  as  applying  to  superior  advantages, 
can  be  drawn  from  these  documents  ;  and  if  we  examine  the 
natural  operation  of  commerce,  the  idea  is  fallacious  ;  and 
if  true,  would  soon  be  injurious.  The  great  support  of  com- 
merce consists  in  the  balance  being  a  level  of  benefits  among 
all  nations. 

Two  merchants  of  different  nations  trading  together,  will 
both  become  rich,  and  each  makes  the  balance  in  his  own 
favor ;  consequently  they  do  not  get  rich  out  of  each  other ; 
and  it  is  the  same  with  respect  to  the  nations  in  which  thev 
reside.  The  case  must  be,  that  each  nation  must  get  rich 
out  of  its  own  means,  and  increase  that  riches  by  something 
which  it  procures  from  another  in  exchange. 

If  a  merchant  in  England  sends  an  article  of  English 
manufacture  abroad,  which  costs  him  a  shilling  at  home, 
and  imports  something  which  sells  for  two,  he  makes  a 
balance  of  one  shilling  in  his  own  favor :  but  this  is  nol 
gained  out  of  the  foreign  nation,  or  the  foreign  merchant 
for  he  also  does  the  same  by  the  article  he  receives,  and 
neither  has  a  balance  of  advantage  upon  the  other.  The 
original  value  of  the  two  articles  in  tneir  proper  countries 
were  but  two  shillings ;  but  by  changing  their  places,  they 
acquire  a  new  idea  of  value,  equal  to  double  what  they  had 
at  first,  and  that  increased  value  is  equally  divided. 

There  is  no  otherwise  a  balance  on  foreign  than  on  do- 
mestic commerce.  The  merchants  of  London  and  Newcastle 
trade  on  the  same  principle,  as  if  they  resided  in  different 
nations,  and  make  their  balances  in  the  same  manner :  yet 
London  does  not  set  rich  out  of  Newcastle,  any  more  than 
Newcastle  out  or  London :  but  coals,  the  merchandize  of 
Newcastle,  have  an  additional  value  at  London,  and  London 
merchandize  has  the  same  at  Newcastle. 


160  BIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

Though  the  principle  of  all  commerce  is  the  same,  the 
domestic,  in  a  national  view,  is  the  part  the  most  beneficial ; 
because  the  whole  of  the  advantages,  on  both  sides,  rest 
within  the  nation  ;  whereas,  in  foreign  commerce,  it  is  only 
a  participation  of  one  half. 

The  most  unprofitable  of  all  commerce,  is  that  connected 
with  foreign  dominion.  To  a  few  individuals  it  may  be 
beneficial,  merely  because  it  is  commerce :  but  to  the  nation 
it  is  a  loss.  The  expense  of  maintaining  dominion  more 
than  absorbs  the  profits  of  any  trade.  It  does  not  increase 
the  general  quantity  in  the  world,  but  operates  to  lessen  it ; 
and  as  a  greater  mass  would  be  afloat  by  relinquishing  do- 
minion, the  participation  without  the  expense  would  be  more 
valuable  than  a  greater  quantity  with  it. 

But  it  is  impossible  to  engross  commerce  by  dominion ; 
and  therefore  it  is  still  more  fallacious.  It  cannot  exist  in 
confined  channels,  and  necessarily  breaks  out  by  regular  or 
irregular  means  that  defeat  the  attempt,  and  to  succeed 
would  be  still  worse.  France,  since  the  revolu  cion,  has  been 
more  than  indifferent  as  to  foreign  possessions ;  and  other 
nations  will  become  the  same  when  they  investigate  the  sub- 
ject with  respect  to  commerce. 

To  the  expense  of  dominion  is  to  be  added  that  of  navies, 
and  when  the  amount  of  the  two  is  subtracted  from  the 
profits  of  commerce,  it  will  appear,  that  what  is  called  the 
balance  of  trade,  even  admitting  it  to  exist,  is  not  enjoyed 
by  the  nation,  but  absorbed  by  the  government. 

The  idea  of  having  navies  for  the  protection  of  commerce, 
is  delusive.  It  is  putting  the  means  of  destruction  for  the 
means  of  protection.  Commerce  needs  no  other  protection 
than  the  reciprocal  interest  which  every  nation  feels  in  sup- 
porting it — it  is  common  stock — it  exists  by  a  balance  of 
advantages  to  all ;  and  the  only  interruption  it  meets,  is  from 
the  present  uncivilized  state  of  governments,  and  which  ia 
its  common  interest  to  reform.* 

Quitting  this  subject,  I  now  proceed  to  other  matters. — 
A.S  it  is  necessary  to  include  England  in  the  prospect  of  & 
general  reformation,  it  is  proper  to  inquire  into  the  defects 

*  When  I  saw  Mr.  Pitt's  mode  of  estimating  the  balance  of  trade,  in 
one  of  his  parliamentary  speeches,  he  appeared  to  me  to  know  nothing 
of  the  nature  and  interest  of  commerce ;  and  no  man  has  more  wantonly 
tortured  it  than  himself.  During  a  period  of  peace,  it  has  been  shackled 
with  the  calamities  of  war.  Three  times  has  it  been  thrown  into  stagna- 
tion, and  the  vessels  unmanned  by  impressing,  w,ithin  less  than  four  years 
of  peace. 


EIGHTS   OF   M AIT.  161 

•of  its  government.  It  is  only  by  each  nation  reforming  its 
own,  mat  the  whole  can  be  improved,  and  the  full  benefit  of 
reformation  enjoyed.  Only  partial  advantages  can  flow 
from  partial  reforms. 

France  and  England  are  the  only  two  countries  in  Europe 
where  a  reformation  in  government  could  have  successfully 
begun.  The  one  secure  by  the  ocean,  and  the  other  by  the 
immensity  of  its  internal  strength,  could  defy  the  malig- 
nancy of  foreign  despotism.  But  it  is  with  revolutions  as 
with  commerce,  the  advantages  increase  by  their  becoming 
general,  and  double  to  either  what  eacn  would  receive 
alone. 

As  a  new  system  is  now  opening  to  the  view  of  the  world, 
the  European  courts  are  plotting  to  counteract  it.  Alliances, 
contrary  to  all  former  systems,  are  agitating,  and  a  common 
interest  of  courts  is  forming  against  the  common  interest  of 
man.  The  combination  draws  a  line  that  runs  throughout 
Europe,  and  presents  a  case  so  entirely  new,  as  to  exclude 
all  calculations  from  former  circumstances.  While  despot- 
ism warred  with  despotism,  man  had  no  interest  in  the 
contest;  but  in  a  cause  that  unites  the  soldier  with  the 
citizen,  and  nation  with  nation,  the  despotism  of  courts, 
though  it  feels  the  danger,  and  meditates  revenge,  is  afraid 
to  strike. 

No  question  has  arisen  within  the  records  of  history  that 
pressed  with  the  importance  of  the  present.  It  is  not 
whether  this  or  that  party  shall  be  in  or  out,  or  whig  or 
tory,  or  high  or  low  shall  prevail ;  but  whether  man  shall 
inherit  his  rights,  and  universal  civilization  take  place  ?— 
Whether  the  fruits  of  his  labor  shall  be  enjoyed  by  himself, 
or  consumed  by  the  profligacy  of  governments  ? — Whethei 
robbery  shall  be  banished  from  courts,  and  wretchedness 
from  countries  ? 

When,  in  countries  that  are  called  civilized,  we  see  age 
going  to  the  work-house,  and  youth  to  the  gallows,  some- 
thing must  be  wrong  in  the  system  of  government.  It 
would  seem,  by  the  exterior  appearance  of  such  countries, 
that  all  was  happiness ;  but  there  lies  hidden  from  the  eye 
of  common  observation,  a  mass  of  wretchedness  that  has 
scarcely  any  other  chance,  than  to  expire  in  poverty  or 
infamy.  Its  entrance  into  life  is  marked  with  tne  presage 
of  its  fate ;  and  uritil  this  is  remedied,  it  is  in  vain  to 
punish. 

Civil  government  does  not  exist  by  executions ;  but  in 


162  EIGHTS   OF  MAN. 

making  that  provision  for  the  instruction  of  youth,  and  the 
support  of  age,  as  to  exclude,  as  much  as  possible,  profligacy 
from  the  one,  and  despair  from  the  other.  Instead  of  this, 
the  resources  of  a  country  are  lavished  upon  kings,  upon 
courts,  upon  hirelings,  impostors  and  prostitutes ;  and  even 
the  poor  themselves,  with  all  their  wants  upon  them,  are 
compelled  to  support  the  fraud  that  oppresses  them. 

Why  is  it,  that  scarcely  any  are  executed  but  the  poor  ? 
The  fact  is  a  proof,  among  other  things,  of  a  wretchedness  in 
their  condition.  Bred  up  without  morals,  and  cast  upon  the 
world  without  a  prospect,  they  are  the  exposed  sacrifice  of 
vice  and  legal  barbarity.  The  millions  that  are  superfluously 
wasted  upon  governments  are  more  than  sufficient  to  reform 
those  evils,  and  to  benefit  the  condition  of  every  man  in  a 
nation,  not  included  in  the  purlieus  of  a  court.  This  I  hope 
to  make  appear  in  the  progress  of  this  work. 

It  is  the  nature  of  compassion  to  associate  with  misfortune. 
In  taking  up  this  subject,  I  seek  no  recompense — I  fear  no 
consequences.  Fortified  with  that  proud  integrity,  that 
disdains  to  triumph  or  to  yield,  I  will  advocate  the  rights 
of  man. 

At  an  early  period,  little  more  than  sixteen  years  of  age, 
raw  and  adventurous,  and  heated  with  the  false  heroism  01 
a  master  *  who  had  served  in  a  man  of  war,  I  began  the 
carver  of  my  own  fortune,  and  entered  on  board  the  priva- 
teer Terrible,  captain  Death.  From  this  adventure  I  was 
happily  prevented  by  the  affectionate  and  moral  remon- 
strance of  a  good  father,  who,  from  his  own  habits  of  life, 
being  of  the  Quaker  profession,  must  have  begun  to  look 
upon  me  as  lost.  But  the  impression,  much  as  it  effected  at 
tne  time,  began  to  wear  away,  and  I  entered  afterwards  in 
the  privateer,  King  of  Prussia,  captain  Mendez,  and  went  in 
her  to  sea.  Yet,  from  such  a  beginning,  and  with  all  the 
inconveniences  of  early  life  against  me,  I  am  proud  to  say, 
that  with  a  perseverance  undismayed  by  difficulties,  a  disin- 
terestedness that  compels  respect,  I  have  not  only  contributed 
to  raise  a  new  empire  in  the  world,  founded  on  a  new  system 
of  government,  but  I  have  arrived  at  an  eminence  in  politi- 
cal literature,  the  most  difficult  of  all  lines  to  succeed  and 
excel  in,  which  aristocracy,  with  all  its  aids,  has  not  been 
able  to  reach  or  to  rival. 

Knowing  my  own  heart,  and  feeling  myself,  as  I  now  do, 

*  Rev.  William  Knowles,  master  of  the  grammar  school  at  Thetford,  in  Nor 
folk. 


RIGHTS   OF  MAN.  163 

superior  to  all  the  skirmish  of  party,  the  inveteracy  of  in- 
terested or  mistaken  opponents,  I  answer  not  to  falsehood  or 
abuse,  but  proceed  to  the  defects  of  the  English  government.* 

*  Politics  and  self-interest  have  been  so  uniformly  connected,  that  the  world, 
from  being  so  often  deceived,  has  a  right  to  be  suspicious  of  public  characters : 
but  with  regard  to  myself,  I  am  perfectly  easy  on  this  head.  I  did  not,  at  my 
first  setting  out  in  public  life  nearly  seventeen  years  ago,  turn  my  thoughts  to 
subjects  of  government  from  motives  of  interest — and  my  conduct  from  that 
moment  to  this,  proves  the  fact.  I  saw  an  opportunity  in  which  I  thought  I 
could  do  some  good,  and  I  followed  exactly  what  my  heart  dictated.  I  neither 
read  books,  nor  studied  other  people's  opinions.  I  thought  for  myself.  Tho 
case  was  this: 

During  the  suspension  of  the  old  governments  in  America,  both  before  and 
at  the  breaking  out  of  hostilities,  I  was  struck  with  the  order  and  decorum  with 
which  every  thing  was  conducted;  and  impressed  with  the  idea,  that  a  little 
more  than  what  society  naturally  performed,  was  all  the  government  that  waa 
necessary,  and  that  monarchy  and  aristocracy  were  frauds  and  impositions 
upon  mankind.  On  these  principles  I  published  the  pamphlet  Common  Sense. 
The  success  it  met  with  was  beyond  any  thing  since  the  invention  of  printing. 
I  gave  a  copy-right  to  every  state  in  the  union,  and  the  demand  ran  to  not 
less  than  one  hundred  thousand  copies.  I  continued  the  subject  in  the  same 
manner,  under  the  title  of  The  Crisis,  till  the  complete  establishment  of  the 
revolution 

After  the  declaration  of  independence,  congress,  unanimously  and  unknown 
to  me,  appointed  me  secretary  in  the  foreign  department.  This  was  agreeable 
to  me.  because  it  gave  me  an  opportunity  of  seeing  into  the  abilities  of  foreign 
courts,  and  their  manner  of  doing  business.  But  a  misunderstanding  arising 
between  congress  and  me,  respecting  one  of  their  commissioners,  then  in 
Europe,  Mr.  Silas  Deane,  I  resigned  the  office. 

When  the  war  ended,  I  went  from  Philadelphia  to  Bordentown,  on  the  east 
bank  of  the  Delaware,  where  I  have  a  small  place.  Congress  was  at  this  time 
at  Princeton,  fifteen  miles  distant ;  and  general  Washington's  head-quarters 
were  at  Rocky-Hill,  within  the  neighborhood  of  congress,  for  the  purpose  of 
resigning  his  commission  (the  object  for  which  he  accepted  it  being  accom- 
plished) and  of  retiring  to  private  life.  While  he  was  on  this  business,  he 
wrote  me  the  letter  which  I  here  subjoin. 

Rocky-Hill,  Sept  10,  1783. 

I  have  learned  since  I  have  been  at  this  place,  that  you  are  at  Bordentown. 
Whether  for  the  sake  of  retirement  or  economy,  I  know  not.  Be  it  for  either, 
for  both,  or  whatever  it  may,  if  you  will  come  to  this  place  and  partake  with 
me,  I  shall  be  exceedingly  happy  to  see  you. 

Your  presence  may  remind  congress  of  your  past  services  to  this  country ; 
and  if  it  is  in  my  power  to  impress  them,  command  my  best  exertions  with 
freedom,  as  they  will  be  rendered  cheerfully  by  one,  who  entertains  a  lively 
sense  of  the  importance  of  your  works,  and  who,  with  much  pleasure,  subscribes 
himself,  Your  sincere  friend, 

G.  WASHINGTON. 

During  the  war,  in  the  latter  end  of  the  year  1780,  I  formed  to  myself  the 
design  of  coming  over  to  England,  and  communicated  it  to  general  Greene, 
who  was  then  in  Philadelphia,  on  his  route  to  the  southward,  general  Wash- 
ington being  then  at  too  great  a  distance  to  communicate  with  immediately. 
1  was  strongly  impressed  with  the  idea  that  if  I  could  get  over  to  England, 
without  being  known,  and  only  remain  in  safety  till  I  could  get  out  a  publioa 


164  EIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

I  begin  with  charters  and  corporations. 

It  is  a  perversion  of  terms  to  say,  that  a  charter  givei 
rights.  It  operates  by  a  contrary  effect,  that  of  taking  rights 
away.  Bights  are  inherently  in  all  the  inhabitants;  but 
charters,  by  annulling  those  rights  in  the  majority,  leave 
the  right,  by  exclusion,  in  the  hands  of  a  few.  If  char- 
ters were  constructed  so  as  to  express  in  direct  terms,  "  that 
every  inhabitant,  who  is  not  a  member  of  a  corporation, 
shall  not  exercise  the  right  of  voting"  such  charters  would 
in  the  face  be  charters,  not  of  rights,  but  of  exclusion.  The 
effect  is  the  same  under  the  form  they  now  stand ;  and  the 
only  persons  on  whom  they  operate,  are  the  persons  whom 
they  exclude.  Those  whose  rights  are  guaranteed,  by  not 
being  taken  away,  exercise  no  other  rights  than  as  members 
of  the  community  they  are  entitled  to  without  a  charter ; 
and  therefore,  all  charters  have  no  other  than  an  indirect 
negative  operation.  They  do  not  give  rights  to  A,  but  they 
make  a  difference  in  favor  of  A,  by  taking  away  the  rights 
of  B,  and  consequently  are  instruments  of  injustice. 

tion,  I  could  open  the  67 es  of  the  country  with  respect  to  the  madness  and 
stupidity  of  its  government.  I  saw  that  the  parties  in  parliament  had  pitted 
themselves  as  far  as  they  could  go,  and  could  make  no  new  impressions  on 
each  other.  General  Greene  entered  fully  into  my  views,  but  the  affair  of 
Arnold  and  Andre  happening  just  after,  he  changed  his  mind,  and,  under 
strong  apprehensions  for  my  safety,  wrote  to  me  very  pressingly  from  Anna- 
polis, in  Maryland,  to  give  up  the  design,  which,  with  some  reluctance,  I  did. 
Soon  after  this  I  accompanied  colonel  Laurens  (son  of  Mr.  Laurens,  who  was 
then  in  the  Tower)  to  France,  on  business  from  congress.  We  landed  at 
1'Orient,  and  while  I  remained  there,  he  being  gone  forward,  a  circumstance 
occurred  that  renewed  my  former  design.  An  English  packet  from  Falmouth 
to  New  York,  with  government  despatches  on  board,  was  brought  into 
1'Orient.  That  a  packet  should  be  taken,  is  no  very  extraordinary  thing ;  but 
that  the  despatches  should  be  taken  with  it  will  scarcely  be  credited,  as 
they  are  always  slung  at  the  cabin  window,  in  a  bag  loaded  with  cannon  ball, 
and  ready  to  be  sunk  in  a  moment.  The  fact,  however,  is  as  I  have  stated  it, 
for  the  despatches  came  into  my  hands,  and  I  read  them.  The  capture,  as 
I  was  informed,  succeeded  by  the  following  stratagem : — the  captain  of  the 
privateer  Madame,  who  spoke  English,  on  coming  up  with  the  packet,  passed 
himself  for  the  captain  of  an  English  frigate,  and  invited  the  captain  of  the 
packet  on  board,  which,  when  done,  he  sent  some  of  his  hands  and  secured  the 
mail.  But  be  the  circumstances  of  the  capture  what  they  may,  I  speak  with 
certainty  as  to  the  despatches.  They  were  sent  up  to  Paris,  to  count  Vergen- 
nes,  and  when  colonel  Laurens  and  myself  returned  to  America,  we  took  the 
originals  to  congress. 

By  these  despatches  I  saw  further  into  the  stupidity  of  the  English  cabinet 
thaa  I  otherwise  could  have  done,  and  I  renewed  my  former  design.  But 
colonel  Laurens  was  so  unwilling  to  return  alone,  more  especially,  as  among 
other  matters,  he  had  a  charge  of  upwards  of  two  hundred  thousand  pounds 
sterling  in  money,  that  I  gave  in  to  his  wishes,  and  finally  gave  up  my  plan. 
But  I  am  r.ow  certain,  that  if  I  could  have  executed  it,  it  would  not  have  beet 
^Itosrethei  unsuccessful. 


RIGHTS   OF  MAN.  165 

But  charters  and  corporations  have  a  more  extensive  evil 
effect  than  what  relates  merely  to  elections.  They  are 
sources  of  endless  contention  in  the  places  where  they  exist ; 
and  they  lessen  the  common  rights  of  national  society.  A 
native  of  England,  under  the  operations  of  these  chai  ters 
and  corporations,  cannot  be  said  to  be  an  Englishman  in  the 
full  sense  of  the  word.  He  is  not  free  of  the  nation,  in  the 
same  manner  that  a  Frenchman  is  free  of  France,  and  an 
American  of  America.  His  rights  are  circumscribed  to  the 
town,  and,  in  some  cases,  to  the  parish  of  his  birth ;  and  in 
all  other  parts,  though  in  his  native  land,  he  must  undergo 
a  local  naturalization  by  purchase,  or  he  is  forbidden  or  ex- 
pelled the  place.  This  species  of  feudality  is  kept  up  to 
aggrandize  the  corporations  to  the  ruin  of  the  towns  ;  and 
the  effect  is  visible. 

The  generality  of  corporation  towns  are  in  a  state  of  soli- 
tary decay,  and  prevented  from  further  ruin  only  by  some 
circumstances  in  their  situation,  such  as  a  navigable  river, 
or  a  plentiful  surrounding  country.  As  population  is  one 
of  the  chief  sources  of  wealth,  (for  without  it  land  itself  has 
no  value,)  every  thing  which  operates  to  prevent  it  must 
lessen  the  value  of  property ;  and  as  corporations  have  not 
only  this  tendency,  but  directly  this  effect,  they  cannot  but 
be  injurious,  if  any  policy  were  to  be  followed,  instead  of 
that  of  general  freedom,  to  every  person  to  settle  where  he 
chose  (as  in  France  or  America,)  it  would  be  more  consis- 
tent to  give  encouragement  to  new  comers,  than  to  preclude 
their  admission  by  exacting  premiums  from  them.* 

The  persons  most  immediately  interested  in  the  abolition 
of  corporations,  are  the  inhabitants  of  the  towns  where  cor- 
porations are  established.  The  instances  of  Manchester, 
Birmingham,  and  Sheffield,  show,  by  contrast,  the  injury 
which  those  Gothic  institutions  are  to  property  and  commerce. 
A  few  examples  may  be  found,  such  as  that  of  London, 

*  It  is  difficult  to  account  for  the  origin  of  charter  and  corporation  towns, 
unless  *e  suppose  them  to  have  arisen  out  of,  or  having  been  connected  with 
gome  species  of  garrison  services.  The  times  in  which  they  began  to  justify  this 
idea.  The  generality  of  those  towns  have  been  garrisons,  and  the  corpora- 
tions were  charged  with  the  care  of  the  ga»es  of  the  towns,  when  no  military 
garrison  was  present.  Their  refusing  or  granting  admission  to  strangers, 
which  has  produced  the  custom  of  giving,  selling,  and  buying  freedom,  haa 
more  of  the  nature  of  garrison  authority  than  civil  government.  Soldiers  are 
free  of  all  corporations  throughout  the  nation,  by  the  same  propriety  that 
every  soldier  is  free  of  every  garrison,  and  no  other  persons  are.  He  can  fol- 
low any  employment,  with  the  permission  of  his  officers,  in  any  corporation 
ICTP  thronphnnt  the  nation. 


366  EIGHTS   OF  MAN. 

whose  natural  and  commercial  advantages,  ovr.ng  to  its  sitna 
tion  on  the  Thames,  is  capable  of  bearing  up  against  the 
political  evils  of  a  corporation ;  but  in  almost  all  other  cases 
the  fatality  is  too  visible  to  be  doubted  or  denied. 

Though  the  whole  nation  is  not  so  directly  affected  by  the 
depression  of  property  in  corporation  towns  as  the  inhabi 
tants  themseives,  it  partakes  of  the  consequences.  By  less- 
ening the  value  of  property,  the  quantity  of  national  com- 
merce is  curtailed.  Every  man  is  a  customer  in  proportion 
to  his  ability ;  and  as  all  parts  of  a  nation  trade  with  each 
other,  whatever  affects  any  of  the  parts,  must  necessarily 
communicate  to  the  whole. 

As  one  of  the  houses  of  the  English  parliament  is,  in  a 
great  measure,  made  up  by  elections  from  these  corporations ; 
and  as  it  is  unnatural  that  a  pure  stream  would  flow  from  a 
foul  fountain,  its  vices  are  but  a  continuation  of  the  vices 
of  its  origin.  A  man  of  moral  honor  and  good  political 
principles,  cannot  submit  to  the  mean  drudgery  and  dis- 
graceral  arts,  by  which  such  elections  are  carried.  To  be  a 
successful  candidate,  he  must  be  destitute  of  the  qualities 
that  constitute  a  just  legislator:  and  being  thus  disciplined 
to  corruption  by  the  mode  of  entering  into  parliament,  it  is 
not  to  be  expected  that  the  representative  should  be  better 
than  the  man. 

Mr.  Burke,  in  speaking  of  the  English  representation,  has 
advanced  as  bold  a  challenge  as  ever  was  given  in  the  days 
of  chivalry.  "  Our  representation,"  says  he,  "  has  been 
found  perfectly  adequate  to  all  the  purposes  for  which  a  repre- 
sentation of  the  people  can  be  desired  or  devised.  I  defy," 
continues  he,  "  the  enemies  of  our  constitution  to  show  the 
contrary."  This  declaration  from  a  man,  who  has  been  in 
constant  opposition  to  all  the  measures  of  parliament  the 
whole  of  his  political  life,  a  year  or  two  excepted,  is  most 
extraordinary,  and,  comparing  him  with  himself,  admits  of 
no  other  alternative,  than  that  he  acted  against  his  judgment 
as  a  member,  or  has  declared  contrary  to  it  as  an  author. 

But  it  is  not  in  the  representation  only  that  the  defects  lie, 
and  therefore  I  proceed  in  the  next  place  to  aristocracy. 

"What  is  called  the  house  of  peers,  is  constituted  on  a  ground 
very  similar  to  that,  against  which  there  is  a  law  in  other 
cases.  It  amounts  to  a  combination  of  persons  in  one  com- 
mon interest.  No  reason  can  be  given,  why  a  house  of  legis- 
lation should  be  composed  entirely  of  men  whose  occupation 
consists  in  letting  landed  property,  than  why  it  should  be 


RIGHTS   OF  MAN. 

composed  of  those  who  hire,  or  of  brewers,  or  bakers,  or  any 
other  separate  class  of  men. 

Mr.  Burke  calls  this  house,  "  the  great  ground  and  pillar 
of  security  to  the  landed  interest"  Let  us  examine  this  idea. 

What  pillar  of  security  does  the  landed  interest  require, 
more  than  any  other  interest  in  the  state,  or  what  right  has 
it  to  a  distinct  and  separate  representation  from  the,  general 
interest  of  a  nation  ?  The  only  use  to  be  made  of  this  power, 
(and  which  it  has  always  made,)  is  to  ward  off  taxes  from 
itself,  and  throw  the  burden  upon  such  articles  of  consump- 
tion by  which  itself  would  be  least  affected. 

That  this  has  been  the  consequence  (and  will  always  be  the 
consequence  of  constructing  governments  on  combinations,) 
is  evident,  with  respect  to  England,  from  the  history  of  its 
taxes. 

Notwithstanding  taxes  have  increased  and  multiplied  upon 
every  article  of  common  consumption,  the  land  tax,  which 
more  particularly  affects  this  "  pillar,"  has  diminished.  In 
1788,  the  amount  of  the  land-tax  was  1,950,OOOZ.  which  is 
half  a  million  less  than  it  produced  almost  a  hundred  years 
ago,  notwithstanding  the  rentals  are  in  many  instance  doubled 
since  that  period. 

Before  the  coming  of  the  Hanoverians,  the  taxes  were  di- 
vided in  nearly  equal  proportions  between  the  land  and  arti- 
cles of  consumption,  the  land  bearing  rather  the  largest 
share ;  but  since  that  era,  nearly  thirteen  millions  annually 
of  new  taxes  have  been  thrown  upon  consumption.  The 
consequence  of  which  has  been  a  constant  increase  in  the 
number  and  wretchedness  of  the  poor,  and  in  the  amount  of 
the  poor-rates.  Yet  here  again  the  burden  does  not  fall  in 
equal  proportions  on  the  aristocracy  with  the  rest  of  the 
community.  Their  residences,  whether  in  town  or  country, 
are  not  mixed  with  the  habitations  of  the  poor. — They  live 
apart  from  distress,  and  the  expense  of  relieving  it.  it  is  in 
manufacturing  towns  and  laboring  villages  that  those  burdens 
press  the  heaviest ;  in  many  of  which  it  is  one  class  of  poor 
supporting  another. 

Several  of  the  most  heavy  and  productive  taxes  are  so 
contrived,  as  to  give  an  exemption  to  this  pillar,  thus  stand- 
ing in  its  own  defence.  The  tax  upon  beer  brewed  for  sale 
does  not  affect  the  aristocracy,  who  brew  their  own  beer  free 
of  this  duty.  It  falls  only  on  those  who  have  not  conven- 
iency  or  ability  to  brew,  and  who  must  purchase  it  in  small 
quantities.  But  what  will  mankind  think  of  the  justice  of 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

taxation,  when  they  know,  that  this  tax  alone,  from  which 
the  aristocracy  are  from  circumstances  exempt,  is  nearly 
equal  to  the  whole  of  the  land-tax,  being  in  the  year  1788, 
and  it  is  not  less  now,  1,666,152Z,  and  with  its  proportion  of 
the  taxes  on  malt  and  hops,  it  exceeds  it.  That  a  single  ar- 
ticle thus  partially  consumed,  and  that  chiefly  by  the  work- 
ing part,  should  be  subject  to  a  tax  equal  to  that  on  the 
whole  rental  of  a  nation,  is,  perhaps,  a  fact  not  to  be  paral- 
leled in  the  history  of  revenues. 

This  is  one  of  the  consequences  resulting  from  a  house  of 
legislation,  composed  on  the  ground  of  a  combination  of 
common  interest ;  for  whatever  their  separate  politics  as  to 
parties  may  be,  in  this  they  are  united.  Whether  a  combi- 
nation acts  to  raise  the  price  of  an  article  for  sale,  or  the 
rate  of  wages ;  or  whether  it  acts  to  throw  taxes  from  itself 
upon  another  class  of  the  community,  the  principle  and  the 
effect  are  the  same :  and  if  the  one  be  illegal,  it  will  be 
difficult  to  show  that  the  other  ought  to  exist. 

It  is  no  use  to  say,  that  taxes  are  first  proposed  in  the 
house  of  commons ;  for  as  the  other  house  has  always  a 
negative,  it  can  always  defend  itself ;  and  it  would  be  ridi- 
culous to  suppose  that  its  acquiescence  in  the  measures  to 
be  proposed  were  not  understood  beforehand.  Besides 
which,  it  has  obtained  so  much  influence  by  borough  traffic, 
and  so  many  of  its  relations  and  connexions  are  distributed 
on  both  sides  of  the  commons,  as  to  give  it,  besides  an  abso- 
lute negative  in  the  house,  a  preponderancy  in  the  other,  in 
all  matters  of  common  concern. 

It  is  difficult  to  discover  what  is  meant  by  the  landed  in- 
terest, if  it  does  not  mean  a  combination  of  aristocratical 
land-holders,  opposing  their  own  pecuniary  interest  to  that 
of  the  farmer,  and  every  branch  of  trade,  commerce,  and 
manufacture.  In  all  other  respects,  it  is  the  only  interest  that 
needs  no  partial  protection.  It  enjoys  the  general  protec- 
tion of  the  world.  Every  individual,  high  or  low,  is  inter- 
ested in  the  fruits  of  the  earth ;  men,  women,  and  children, 
j)f  all  ages  and  degrees,  will  turn  out  to  assist  the  farmer, 
rather  than  a  harvest  should  not  be  got  in ;  and  they  will 
not  act  thus  by  any  other  property.  It  is  the  only  one  for 
which  the  common  prayer  of  mankind  is  put  up,  and  the 
only  one  that  can  never  fail  from  the  want  of  means.  It  is 
the  interest,  not  of  the  policy,  but  of  the  existence  of  man, 
and  when  it  ceases,  he  must  cease  to  be. 

No  other  interest  in  a  nation  stands  on  the  same  united 


SIGHTS   OF   MAN.  169 

support.  Commerce,  manufactures,  arts,  sciences,  and  every 
thing  else,  compared  with  this  are  supported  but  in  parts. 
Their  prosperity  or  their  decay  has  not  the  same  universal 
influence.  When  the  valleys  laugh  and  sing,  it  is  not  the 
farmer  only,  but  all  creation  that  rejoices.  It  is  a  prosperity 
that  excludes  all  envy  ;  and  this  cannot  be  said  of  anything 
else. 

Why  then  does  Mr.  Burke  talk  of  his  house  of  peers,  as 
the  pillar  of  the  landed  interest  ?  Were  that  pillar  to  sink 
into  the  earth,  the  same  landed  property  would  continue, 
and  the  same  ploughing,  sowing,  ana  reaping  would  go  on. 
The  aristocracy  are  not  the  farmers  who  work  the  land,  and 
raise  the  produce,  but  are  the  mere  consumers  of  the  rent ; 
and  when  compared  with  the  active  world,  are  the  drones, 
a  seraglio  of  males,  who  neither  collect  the  honey  nor  form 
the  hive,  but  exist  only  for  lazy  enjoyment. 

Mr.  Burke,  in  his  first  essay,  called  aristocracy,  '•''the 
Corinthian  capital  of  polished  society"  Towards  completing 
the  figure,  he  has  now  added  thejrillar,  but  still  the  base  is 
wanting  ;  and  whenever  a  nation  chooses  to  act  a  Samson, 
not  a  blind,  but  bold,  down  goes  the  temple  of  Dagoii,  the 
lords  and  the  Philistines. 

If  a  house  of  legislation  is  to  be  composed  of  men  of  one 
class,  for  the  purpose  of  protecting  a  distinct  interest,  all 
the  other  interests  should  have  the  same.  The  inequality 
as  well  as  the  burden  of  taxation,  arises  from  admitting  it 
in  one  case  and  not  in  all.  Had  there  been  a  house  of  farm- 
ers, there  had  been  no  game  laws ;  or  a  house  of  merchants 
and  manufacturers,  the  taxes  had  neither  been  so  unequal 
nor  so  excessive.  It  is  from  the  power  of  taxation  being  in 
the  hands  of  those  who  can  throw  so  great  a  part  of  it  from 
their  own  shoulders,  that  it  has  raged  without  a  check. 

Men  of  small  or  moderate  estates,  are  more  injured  by  the 
taxes  being  thrown  on  articles  of  consumption,  than  thev 
are  eased  by  warding  it  from  landed  property,  for  the  foJ 
lowing  reasons : 

1st,  They  consume  more  of  the  productive  taxable 
articles,  in  proportion  to  their  property,  than  those  of  large 
estates. 

2d,  Their  residence  is  chiefly  in  towns,  and  their  property 
in  houses ;  and  the  increase  of  the  poor-rates,  occasioned  by 
taxes  on  consumption,  is  in  much  greater  proportion  than 
the  land-tax  has  been  favored.  In  Birmingham,  the  poor- 
rates  are  not  less  than  seven  shillings  in  the  Dound. '  From 


170  EIGHTS  OF  MAN. 

tliis,  as  is  already  observed,  the  aristocracy  are  in  a  great 
measure  exempt. 

These  are  but  a  part  of  the  mischiefs  flowing  from  the 
wretched  scheme  of  a  house  of  peers. 

As  a  combination,  it  can  always  throw  a  considerable 
portion  of  taxes  from  itself;  as  an  hereditary  house,  account- 
able to  no  body,  it  resembles  a  rotten  borough,  whose  con- 
sent is  to  be  courted  by  interest.  There  are  but  few  of  its 
members,  who  are  not  in  some  mode  or  other  participators, 
or  disposers  of  the  public  money.  One  turns  a  candle-holder 
or  a  lord  in  waiting  ;  another  a  lord  of  the  bed-chamber,  a 
groom  of  the  stole,  or  any  insignificant  nominal  office,  to 
which  a  salary  is  annexed,  paid  out  of  the  public  taxes, 
and  which  avoids  the  direct  appearance  ot  corruption. 
Such  situations  are  derogatory  to  the  character  of  a  man ; 
and  where  they  can  be  submitted  to,  honor  cannot  reside. 

To  all  these  are  to  be  added  the  numerous  dependants, 
the  long  list  of  the  younger  branches  and  distant  relations, 
who  are  to  be  provided  for  at  the  public  expense :  in  short, 
were  an  estimation  to  be  made  of  the  charge  of  the  aristo- 
cracy to  a  nation,  it  will  be  found  nearly  equal  to  that  of 
supporting  the  poor.  The  duke  of  Eichmond  alone  (and 
there  are  cases  similar  to  his)  takes  away  as  much  for  him- 
self, as  would  maintain  two  thousand  poor  and  aged  persons. 
Is  it,  then,  any  wonder  that  under  such  a  system  of 
government,  taxes  and  rates  have  multiplied  to  their  present 
extent  ? 

In  stating  these  matters,  I  speak  an  open  and  disinterested 
language,  dictated  by  no  passion  but  that  of  humanity.  To 
me,  who  have  not  only  refused  offers,  because  I  thought 
them  improper,  but  have  declined  rewards  I  might  with 
reputation  have  accepted,  it  is  no  wonder  that  meanness  and 
imposition  appear  disgusting.  Independence  is  my  happi- 
ness, and  I  view  things  as  they  are,  without  regard  to  j)lace 
or  person ;  my  country  is  the  world,  and  my  religion  is  to 
do  good. 

Mr.  Burke,  in  speaking  of  the  aristocratical  law  of  primo- 
geniture, says,  "  It  is  the  standard  law  of  our  landed  inheri- 
tance ;  and  which,  without  question,  has  a  tendency,  and  I 
think,"  continues  he,  "a  happy  tendency  to  preserve  a 
character  of  weight  and  consequence." 

Mr.  Burke  may  call  this  law  what  he  pleases,  but  humanity 
and  impartial  reflection  will  pronounce  it  a  law  of  brutal 
injustice.  Were  we  not  accustomed  to  the  daily  practice,  and 


EIGHTS    OF    MAN.  171 

did  we  only  hear  of  it,  as  the  law  of  some  distant  part  of 
the  world,  we  should  conclude  that  the  legislators  of  such 
countries  had  not  arrived  at  a  state  of  civilization. 

As  to  preserving  a  character  of  weight  and  consequence, 
the  case  appears  to  me  directly  the  reverse.  It  is  an  attaint 
upon  character  ;  a  sort  of  privateering  upon  family  property. 
It  may  have  weight  among  dependant  tenants,  but  it  gives 
none  on  a  scale  of  national,  and  much  less  of  universal 
character.  Speaking  for  myself,  my  parents  were  not  able 
to  give  me  a  shilling,  beyond  what  they  gave  me  in  educa- 
tion ;  and  to  do  this  they  distressed  themselves ;  yet  I  possess 
more  of  what  is  called  consequence,  in  the  world,  than  any 
one  in  Mr.  Burke's  catalogue  of  aristocrats. 

Having  thus  glanced  at  some  of  the  defects  of  the  two 
houses  of  parliament,  I  proceed  to  what  is  called  the  crown, 
upon  which  I  shall  be  very  concise. 

It  signifies  a  nominal  office  of  a  million  sterling  a-year, 
the  business  of  which  consists  in  receiving  the  money. 
Whether  the  person  be  wise  or  foolish,  sane  or  insane,  a 
native  or  a  foreigner,  matters  not.  Every  ministry  acts  upon 
the  same  idea  that  Mr.  Burke  writes,  namely,  that  the  people 
must  be  hoodwinked,  and  held  in  superstitious  ignorance  by 
gome  bugbear  or  other ;  and  what  is  called  the  crown  answers 
this  purpose,  and  therefore  it  answers  all  the  purposes  to  be 
expected  from  it.  This  is  more  than  can  be  said  of  the  other 
two  branches. 

The  hazard  to  which  this  office  is  exposed  in  all  countries, 
is  not  from  any  thing  that  can  happen  to  the  man,  but  from 
what  may  happen  to  the  nation ;  the  danger  of  its  coming  to 
its  senses. 

It  has  been  customary  to  call  the  crown  the  executive  power, 
and  the  custom  has  continued,  though  the  reason  has  ceased. 

It  was  called  the  executive,  because  he  whom  it  signified 
used  formerly  to  sit  in  the  character  of  a  judge,  in  aaminis- 
tering  or  executing  the  laws.  The  tribunals  were  then  a  part 
of  the  court.  The  power,  therefore,  which  is  now  called  the 
judicial,  was  what  is  called  the  executive ;  and,  conse- 
quently, one  or  the  other  of  the  terms  is  redundant,  and  one 
of  the  offices  useless.  When  we  speak  of  the  crown  now,  it 
means  nothing ;  it  signifies  neither  a  judge  nor  a  general : 
besides  which,  it  is  the  laws  that  govern,  and  not  the  man. 
The  old  terms  are  kept  up,  and  give  an  appearance  of  conse- 
quence to  empty  forms :  and  the  only  effect  they  have  is  that 
of  increasing  crocuses. 


172  EIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

Before  I  proceed  to  the  means  of  rendering  governments 
more  conducive  to  the  general  happiness  of  mankind,  than 
they  are  at  present,  it  will  not  be  improper  to  take  a  review 
of  the  progress  of  taxation  in  England. 

It  is  a  general  idea,  that  when  taxes  are  once  laid  on,  they 
are  never  taken  off.  However  true  this  may  have  been  of 
late,  it  was  not  always  so.  Either,  therefore,  the  people  of 
former  times  were  more  watchful  over  government  man  those 
of  the  present,  or  government  was  administered  with  less 
extravagance. 

It  is  now  seven  hundred  years  since  the  Korman  conquest, 
and  the  establishment  of  what  is  called  the  crown.  Taking 
this  portion  of  time  in  seven  separate  periods  of  one  hundred 
years  each,  the  amount  of  the  annual  taxes,  at  each  period, 
will  be  as  follows : 

Annual  amount  of  taxes  levied  by  William  the  conqueror,  beginning 

in  the  year  1066, .  £400,000 

Annual  amount  of  taxes  at  one  hundred  years  from  the  conquest, 

(1166) 200,000 

Annual  amount  of  taxes  at  two  hundred  years  from  the  conquest, 

(1266) 150,000 

Annual  amount  of  taxes  at  three  hundred  years  from  the  conquest, 

(1366) 130,000 

Annual  amount  of  taxes  at  four  hundred  years  from  the  conquest, 

(1466) .        100,000 

These  statements,  and  those  which  follow,  are  taken  from 
sir  John  Sinclair's  history  of  the  Revenue;  by  which  it 
appears,  that  taxes  continued  decreasing  for  four  hundred 
years,  at  the  expiration  of  which  time  they  were  reduced 
three-fourths,  v^3.  from  four  hundred  thousand  pounds  to 
one  hundred  thousand.  The  people  of  England,  of  the  pre- 
sent day,  have  a  traditionary  and  histoncal  idea  of  the 
bravery  of  their  ancestors ;  but  whatever  their  virtues  or 
vices  might  have  been,  they  certainly  were  a  people  who 
would  not  be  imposed  upon,  and  who  kept  government  in 
awe  as  to  taxation,  if  not  as  to  principle.  Though  they 
were  not  able  to  expel  the  monarchical  usurpation,  they  re- 
stricted it  to  a  public  economy  of  taxes. 

Let  us  now  review  the  remaining  three  hundred  years. 

Annual  amount  of  taxes  at  five  hundred  years  from  the  conquest, 

(1566) .  £500,000 

Annual  amount  of  taxes  at  six  hundred  years  from  the  conquest, 

(1666) 1,800,000 

Annual  amount  of  taxes  at  the  oresent  time,  (1791)    '   .  .  17,000,000 


RIGHTS   OF   MAN.  178 

The  difference  between  the  first  four  hundred  years  and 
the  last  three,  is  so  astonishing,  as  to  warrant  the  opinion, 
that  the  national  character  of  the  English  has  changed.  It 
would  have  been  impossible  to  have  dragooned  the  former 
English  into  the  excess  of  taxation  that  now  exists ;  and 
when  it  is  considered  that  the  pay  of  the  army,  the  navy, 
and  of  all  the  revenue-officers,  is  the  same  now  as  it  was 
above  a  hundred  years  ago,  when  the  taxes  were  not  above 
a  tenth  part  of  what  they  are  at  present,  it  appears  impos- 
sible to  account  for  the  enormous  increase  ana  expenditure, 
on  any  other  ground  than  extravagance,  corruption,  and 
intrigue.* 

*  Several  of  the  court  newspapers  have  of  late  made  frequent  mention  of 
Wat  Tyler.  That  his  memory  should  be  traduced  by  court  sycophants,  and  all 
those  who  live  on  the  spoil  of  a  public,  is  not  to  be  wondered  at.  He  was, 
however,  the  means  of  checking  the  rage  and  injustice  of  taxation  in  his  time, 
and  the  nation  owed  much  to  his  valor.  The  history  is  concisely  this ; — in  the 
time  of  Richard  II.  a  poll-tax  was  levied,  of  one  shilling  per  head  upon  every 
person  in  the  nation,  of  whatever  class  or  condition,  on  poor  as  well  as  rich, 
above  the  age  of  fifteen  years.  If  any  favor  was  shown  in  the  law,  it  was  to 
the  rich  rather  than  the  poor;  as  no  person  could  be  charged  more  than 
twenty  shillings  for  himself,  family  and  servants,  though  ever  so  numerous — 
while  all  other  families,  under  the  number  of  twenty,  were  charged  per  head. 
Poll-taxes  had  always  been  odious — but  this  being  also  oppressive  and  unjust, 
it  excited,  as  it  naturally  must,  universal  detestation  among  the  poor  and  mid- 
dle classes.  The  person  known  by  the  name  oi  Wat  Tyler,  and  whose  proper 
name  was  Walter,  and  a  tyler  by  trade,  lived  at  Deptfori  The  gatherer  of  the 
poll-tax,  on  coming  to  his  house,  demanded  a  tax  for  one  of  his  daughters, 
whom  Tyler  declared  was  under  the  age  of  fifteen.  The  tax-gatherer  insisted 
in  satisfying  himself,  and  began  an  indecent  examination  of  the  girl,  which 
enraging  the  father,  he  struck  him  with  a  hammer,  that  brought  him  to  the 
ground,  and  was  the  cause  of  his  death. 

This  circumstance  served  to  bring  the  discontents  to  an  issue.  The  inhabi 
tants  of  the  neighborhood  espoused  the  cause  of  Tyler,  who,  in  a  few  days, 
was  joined,  according  to  some  historians,  by  upwards  of  fifty  thousand  men, 
and  chosen  their  chief.  With  this  force  he  marched  to  London,  to  demand  an 
abolition  of  the  tax,  and  a  redress  of  other  grievances.  The  court,  finding 
itself  in  a  forlorn  condition,  and  unable  to  make  resistance,  agreed,  with 
Richard  at  its  head,  to  hold  a  conference  with  Tyler  in  Smithfield,  making 
many  fair  professions,  courtier-like,  of  its  disposition  to  redress  the  oppres- 
sions. While  Richard  and  Tyler  were  in  conversation  on  these  matters,  each 
being  on  horseback,  Walworth,  then  mayor  of  London,  and  one  of  the  crea- 
tures of  the  court,  watched  an  opportunity,  and,  like  a  cowardly  assassin, 
stabbed  Tyler  with  a  dagger — and  two  or  three  others  falling  upon  him,  he 
was  instantly  sacrificed. 

Tyler  appears  to  have  been  an  intrepid,  disinterested  man,  with  respect  to 
himself.  All  his  proposals  made  to  Richard,  were  on  a  more  just  and  public 
ground,  than  those  which  had  been  made  to  John  by  the  barons ;  and  not- 
withstanding the  sycophancy  of  historians,  and  men  like  Mr.  Burke,  who  seek 
to  gloss  over  a  baae  action  of  the  court  by  traducing  Tyler,  his  fame  will  out- 
live their  falsehood.  If  the  barons  merited  a  monument  to  be  erected  in 
Runneymede,  Tyler  merits  one  in  Smithfield. 


174  EIGHTS    OF   MAU. 

.  "With  the  revolution  of  1688,  and  mote  so  since  the  Hano- 
ver succession,  came  the  destructive  system  of  continental 
intrigues,  and  the  rage  for  foreign  wars  and  foreign  domi- 
nion ;  systems  of  such  secure  mystery,  that  the  expenses 
admit  of  no  accounts ;  a  single  line  stands  for  millions.  To 
what  excess  taxation  might  have  extended,  had  not  the 
French  revolution  contributed  to  break  up  the  system,  and 
put  an  end  to  pretences,  is  impossible  to  say.  Viewed  as 
that  revolution  ought  to  be,  as  the  fortunate  means  of  lessen- 
ing the  load  of  taxes  of  both  countries,  it  is  of  as  much  im- 
portance to  England  as  to  France  ;  and,  if  properly  improved 
to  all  the  advantages  of  which  it  is  capable,  ancl  to  which 
it  leads,  deserves  as  much  celebration  in  the  one  country  as 
the  other. 

In  pursuing  this  subject,  I  shall  begin  with  the  matter 
that  first  presents  itself,  that  of  lessening  the  burden  of  taxes ; 
and  shall  then  add  such  matters  and  propositions,  respecting 
the  three  countries  of  England,  France  and  America,  as  the 
present  prospect  of  things  appears  to  justify ;  I  mean  an 
alliance  of  the  three,  for  the  purposes  that  will  be  mentioned 
in  their  proper  places. 

What  has  happened  may  happen  again.  By  the  state- 
ment before  shown,  of  the  progress  of  taxation,  it  is  seen, 
titat  taxes  have  been  lessened  to  a  fourth  part  of  what  they 
had  formerly  been.  Though  the  present  circumstances  do 
not  admit  01  the  same  reduction,  yet  they  admit  of  such  a 
beginning,  as  may  accomplish  that  end  in  less  time,  than  in 
the  former  case. 

The  amount  of  taxes  for  the  year,  ending  at  Michaelmas, 
1778,  was  as  follows : 

Land  tax .        .        .  £1,950,000 

Customs 8,789,274 

Excise  (including  old  and  new  malt)    .....  6,751,727 

Stamps 1,278,214 

Miscellaneous  taxes  and  incidents        .....  1,803,755 

£15,572,970 

Since  the  vear  1788,  upwards  of  one  million,  new  taxe«, 
have  been  laid  on,  besides  the  produce  of  the  lotteries  ;  and 
as  the  taxes  have  in  general  been  more  productive  since 
than  before,  the  amount  may  be  taken,  in  round  numbers, 
at  £17,000,000. 

N.  B.  The  expense  of  collection  and  the  drawbacks, 
which  together  amount  to  nearly  two  millions,  are  paid  out 


EIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

of  the  gross  amount ;  and  the  above  is  the  net  sum  paid  into 
the  exchequer. 

The  sum  of  seventeen  millions  is  applied  to  two  different 
purposes ;  the  one  to  pay  the  interest  of  the  national  debt, 
the  other  to  pay  the  current  expenses  of  each  year.  About 
nine  millions  are  appropriated  to  the  former ;  and  the  re- 
mainder, being  nearly  eight  millions,  to  the  latter.  As  to 
the  million,  said  to  be  applied  to  the  reduction  of  the  debt, 
it  is  so  much  like  paying  with  one  hand  and  taking  out  with 
the  other,  as  not  to  merit  much  notice. 

It  happened,  fortunately  for  France,  that  she  possessed 
national  domains  for  paying  off  her  debt,  and  thereby 
lessening  her  taxes ;  but  as  this  is  not  the  case  in  Eng- 
land, her  reduction  of  taxes  can  only  take  place  by  reduc- 
ing the-  current  expenses,  which  may  now  be  done  to  the 
amount  of  four  or  five  millions  annually,  as  will  hereafter 
appear.  When  this  is  accomplished,  it  will  more  than 
counterbalance  the  enormous  charge  of  the  American  war ; 
and  the  saving  will  be  from  the  same  source  from  whence 
the  evil  arose. 

As  to  the  national  debt,  however  heavy  the  interest  may 
be  in  taxes,  yet,  as  it  seems  to  keep  alive  a  capital,  useful  to 
commerce,  it  balances  by  its  effects  a  considerable  part  of 
its  own  weight ;  and  as  the  quantity  of  gold  and  silver  in 
England  is,  by  some  means  or  other,  short  of  its  proper  pro- 
portion,* (being  not  more  than  twenty  millions,  whereas  it 
should  be  sixty,)  it  would,  besides  the  injustice,  be  bad 
policy  to  extinguish  a  capital  that  serves  to  supply  that  de- 
tect. But,  with  respect  to  the  current  expense,  whatever  is 
saved  therefrom  is  gain.  The  excess  may  serve  to  keep  cor- 
ruption alive,  but  it  has  no  reaction  on  credit  and  commerce, 
like  the  interest  of  the  debt. 

It  is  now  very  probable,  that  the  English  government  (I 
do  not  mean  trie  nation)  is  unfriendly  to  the  French  revo- 
lution. Whatever  serves  to  expose  the  intrigue  and  lessen 
the  influence  of  courts,  by  lessening  taxation,  will  be  unwel- 
come to  those  who  feed  upon  the  spoil.  Whilst  the  clamor 
of  French  intrigue,  arbitrary  power,  popery,  and  wooden 
shoes  could  be  kept  up,  the  nations  were  easily  allured  and 
alarmed  into  taxes.  Those  days  are  now  past ;  deception, 
it  is  to  be  hoped,  has  reaped  its  last  harvest,  and  better 
times  are  in  prospect  for  both  countries,  and  for  the  world. 

*  Foreign  intrigues,  foreign  wars,  and  foreign  dominions,  will  in  a  great 
measure  account  for  the  deficiency. 


176  JRIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

Taking  it  for  granted  that  an  alliance  may  be  formed  be- 
tween England,  France  and  America,  for  the  purposes  here- 
after to  be  mentioned,  the  national  expenses  of  France  and 
England  may  consequently  be  lessened.  The  same  fleets  and 
armies  will  no  longer  be  necessary  to  either,  and  the  reduc- 
tion can  be  made  ship  for  ship  on  each  side.  But  to  accom- 
plish these  objects,  the  governments  must  necessarily  be 
fitted  to  a  common  correspondent  principle.  Confidence 
can  never  take  place,  while  an  hostile  disposition  remains  in 
either,  or  where  mystery  and  secrecy  on  one  side,  is  opposed 
to  candor  and  openness  on  the  other. 

These  matters  admitted,  the  national  expenses  might  be 
put  back,  for  the  sake  of  a  precedent,  to  what  they  were  at 
some  period  when  France  and  England  were  not  enemies. 
This,  consequently,  must  be  prior  to  the  Hanover  succession, 
and  also  to  the  revolution  of  1688.*  The  first  instance  that 
presents  itself,  antecedent  to  those  dates,  is  in  the  very 
wasteful  and  profligate  time  of  Charles  II.  at  which  time 
England  and  France  acted  as  allies.  If  I  have  chosen  a. 
period  of  great  extravagance,  it  will  serve  to  show  modern 
extravagance  in  a  still  worse  light ;  especially,  as  the  pay  of 
the  navy,  the  army,  and  the  revenue-officers  has  not  increased 
since  that  time. 

The  peace  establishment  was  then  as  follows :  See  sir  John 
Sinclair's  History  of  the  Revenue. 

Navy 800.000J. 

Army 212,000 

Ordnance 40,000 

Civil  List 462,115 


1,014, 115/. 

The  parliament,  however,  settled  the  whole  annual  peace 

*  I  happened  to  be  in  England  at  the  celebration  of  the  centenary  of  the 
revolution  of  1688.  The  characters  of  William  and  Mary  have  always  appeared 
to  me  detestable ;  the  one  seeking  to  destroy  his  uncle,  and  the  other  her 
father,  to  get  possession  of  power  themselves :  yet,  as  the  nation  was  disposed 
to  think  something  of  that  event,  I  felt  hurt  at  seeing  it  ascribe  the  whole  repu- 
tation of  it  to  a  man  who  had  undertaken  it  as  a  job,  and  who,  besides  what  he 
otherwise  got,  charged  six  hundred  thousand  pounds  for  the  expense  of  the 
little  fleet  that  brought  him  from  Holland.  George  I.  acted  the  same  close« 
^sted  part  as  William  had  done,  and  bought  the  duchy  of  Bremen  with  the 
money  he  got  from  England,  two  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  pounds  over  and 
above  his  pay  as  king ;  and  having  thus  purchased  it  at  the  expense  of  Eng- 
land, added  to  it  his  Hanoverian  dominions  for  his  own  private  benefit.  In 
fact,  every  nation  that  does  not  govern  itself,  is  governed  as  a  job.  England 
has  been  the  prey  of  J^bs  ow*r  since  the  revolution. 


RIGHTS   OF  MAN.  177 

eetablishment  at  1,200,000.*  If  we  go  back  to  the  time  of 
Elizabeth,  the  amount  of  all  the  taxes  was  but  half  a  million, 
yet  the  nation  sees  nothing  during  that  period,  that  re- 
proaches it  with  want  of  consequence. 

All  circumstances  then  taken  together,  arising  from  the 
French  revolution,  from  the  approaching  harmony  and  re- 
ciprocal interest  of  the  two  nations,  the  abolition  of  court 
intrigue  on  both  sides,  and  the  progress  of  knowledge  in  the 
science  of  government,  the  annual  expenditure  might  be  put 
back  to  one  million  and  a  half,  viz. 

Navy »    600,000*. 

Army 500,000 

Expenses  of  government        ....     500,000 

l,500,000i 

Even  this  sum  is  six  times  greater  than  the  expenses  of 
government  are  in  America,  yet  the  civil  internal  govern- 
ment of  England  (I  mean  that  administered  by  means  of 
quarter  sessions,  juries,  and  assize,  and  which,  in  fact,  is 
nearly  the  whole,  and  is  performed  by  the  nation,)  is  less 
expense  upon  the  revenue,  than  the  same  species  and  portion 
of  government  is  in  America. 

It  is  time  that  nations  should  be  rational,  and  not  be  gov- 
erned like  animals  for  the  pleasure  of  their  riders.  To  read 
the  history  of  kings,  a  man  would  be  almost  inclined  to  sup- 
pose that  government  consisted  in  stag-hunting,  and  that 
every  nation  paid  a  million  a-year  to  the  huntsman.  Man 
ought  to  have  pride,  or  shame  enough  to  blush  at  being  thus 
imposed  upon,  and  when  he  feels  his  proper  character  he 
will.  Upon  all  subjects  of  this  nature,  there  is  often  passing 
in  the  mind  a  train  of  ideas  he  has  not  yet  accustomed  him- 
self to  encourage  and  communicate.  "Restrained  by  some- 
thing that  puts  on  the  character  of  prudence,  he  acts  the 
hypocrite  to  himself  as  well  as  to  others.  It  is,  however, 
curious  to  observe  how  soon  this  spell  can  be  dissolved.  A 
single  expression,  boldly  conceived  and  uttered,  will  some- 
times put  a  whole  company  into  their  proper  feelings,  and  a 
whole  nation  are  acted  upon  in  the  same  manner. 

As  to  the  offices  of  which  any  civil  government  may  be 
composed,  it  matters  but  little  by  what  names  they  are 

*  Charles,  like  his  predecessors  and  successors,  finding  that  war  was  the  bar- 
Test  of  governments,  engaged  in  a  war  with  the  Dutch,  the  expense  of  which 
increased  the  annual  expenditure  to  1,800,000/.  as  stated  under  the  data  of 
16M;  but  the  peace  establishment  was  but  1.20Q.OOO/. 


178  EIGHTS   OF  MAN. 

described.  In  the  routine  of  business,  as  before  observed, 
whether  a  man  be  styled  a  president,  a  king,  an  emperor,  a 
senator,  or  any  thing  else,  it  is  impossible  that  any  service 
he  can  perform,  can  merit  from  a  nation  more  than  ten 
thousand  pounds  a-year;  and  as  no  man  should  be  paid 
beyond  his  services,  so  every  man  of  a  proper  heart  will  not 
accept  more.  Public  money  ought  to  be  touched  with  the 
most  scrupulous  consciousness  of  honor.  It  is  not  the  pro- 
duce of  riches  only,  but  of  the  hard  earnings  of  labor  and 
poverty.  It  is  drawn  even  from  the  bitterness  of  want  and 
misery.  Not  a  beggar  passes,  or  perishes  in  the  streets, 
whose  mite  is  not  in  that  mass. 

Were  it  possible  that  the  congress  of  America,  could  be 
go  lost  to  their  duty,  and  to  the  interest  of  their  constituents, 
as  to  offer  general  Washington,  as  president  of  America,  a 
million  a-year,  he  would  not,  and  he  could  not  accept  it. 
His  sense  of  honor  is  of  another  kind.  It  has  cost  England 
almost  seventy  millions  sterling,  to  maintain  a  family  im- 
ported from  abroad,  of  very  inferior  capacity  to  thousands 
in  the  nation ;  and  scarcely  a  year  has  passed  that  has  not 
produced  some  mercenary  application.  Even  the  physicians' 
bills  have  been  sent  to  the  public  to  be  paid.  No  wonder 
that  jails  are  crowded,  and  taxes  and  poor-rates  increased. 
Under  such  systems,  nothing  is  to  be  looked  for  but  what 
has  already  happened  ;  and  as  to  reformation,  whenever  it 
comes,  it  must  be  from  the  nation,  and  not  from  the  govern- 
ment. 

To  show  that  the  sum  of  five  hundred  thousand  pounds  is 
more  than  sufficient  to  defray  all  the  expenses  01  govern- 
ment, exclusive  of  navies  and  armies,  the  following  estimate 
is  added  for  any  country,  of  the  same  extent  as  England. 

In  the  first  place,  three  hundred  representatives,  fairly 
elected,  are  sufficient  for  all  the  purposes  to  which  legisla- 
tion can  apply,  and  preferable  to  a  larger  number.  They 
may  be  divided  into  two,  or  three  houses,  or  meet  in  one,  as 
in  France,  or  in  any  manner  a  constitution  shall  direct. 

As  representation  is  always  considered  in  free  countries, 
as  the  most  honorable  of  all  stations,  the  allowance  made  to 
it  is  merely  to  defray  the  expenses  which  the  representative§ 
incur  bv  that  service,  and  not  to  it  as  an  office. 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN.  179 

If  an  allowance  at  the  rate  of  five  hundred  pounds  per  annum  he 
made  to  every  representative,  deducting  for  non-attendance,  the 
expense,  if  the  whole  number  attended  for  six  months  each  year, 
would  be .  75,0001 

The   official   departments  cannot   reasonably  exceed  the   following 
number,  with  the  salaries  annexed  : 
Three  offices,  at  ten  thousand  pounds  each        .  80,000 


Ten  ditto,  at  five  thousand  pounds  each 
Twenty  ditto,  at  two  thousand  pounds  each 
Forty  ditto,  at  one  thousand  pounds  each 
Two  hundred  ditto,  at  five  hundred  pounds  each 
Three  hundred  ditto,  at  two  hundred  pounds  each 
Five  hundred  ditto,  at  one  hundred  pounds  each 
Seven  hundred  ditto,  at  seventy-five  pounds  each 


50,000 
40,000 
40,000 
100,000 
60,000 
60,000 
52,500 

497.500/. 


If  a  nation  chooses,  it  can  deduct  four  per  cent,  from  all 
offices,  and  make  one  of  twenty  thousand  per  annum. 

All  revenue-officers  are  paid  out  of  the  monies  they  collect, 
and  therefore,  are  not  included  in  this  estimation. 

The  foregoing  is  not  offered  as  an  exact  detail  of  offices, 
but  to  show  the  number  and  rate  of  salaries  which  five 
hundred  thousand  pounds  will  support ;  and  it  will,  on 
experience,  be  found  impracticable  to  find  business  sufficient 
to  justify  even  this  expense.  As  to  the  manner  in  which 
office  business  is  now  performed,  the  chiefs  in  several  offices, 
such  as  the  post-office,  and  certain  offices  in  the  exchequer, 
&c.  do  little  more  than  sign  their  names  three  or  four  times 
a-year ;  and  the  whole  duty  is  performed  by  under  clerks. 

Taking,  therefore,  one  million  and  a  half  as  a  sufficient 
peace  establishment  for  all  the  honest  purposes  of  govern- 
ment, which  is  three  hundred  thousand  pounds  more  than 
the  peace  establishment  in  the  profligate  and  prodigal  times 
of  Charles  II.  (notwithstanding,  as  has  been  already  observed, 
the  pay  and  salaries  of  the  army,  navy,  and  revenue-officers, 
continue  the  same  as  at  that  period,)  there  will  remain  a 
surplus  of  upwards  of  six  millions  out  of  the  present  current 
expenses.  The  question  then  will  be,  how  to  dispose  of  this 
surplus. 

Whoever  has  observed  the  manner  in  which  trade  and 
taxes  twist  themselves  together,  must  be  sensible  of  the 
impossibility  of  separating  them  suddenly. 

1st,  Because  the  articles  now  on  hand  are  already  charged 
with  the  duty,  and  the  reduction  cannot  take  place  on  the 
present  stock. 

2d,  Because,  on  all  those  articles  on  which  the  duty  is 
charged  in  the  gross,  such  as  per  barrel,  hogshead,  hundred 


180  BIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

weight,  or  ton,  the  abolition  of  the  duty  does  not  admit  of 
being  divided  down  so  as  fully  to  relieve  the  consumer,  who 
purchases  by  the  pint,  or  the  pound.  The  last  duty  laid  on 
strong  beer  and  ale,  was  three  shillings  per  barrel,  which, 
if  taken  off,  would  lessen  the  purchase  only  half  a  farthing 
per  pint,  and,  consequently,  would  not  reach  to  practical 
relief. 

This  being  the  condition  of  a  greater  part  of  the  taxes,  it 
will  be  necessary  to  look  for  such  others  as  are  free  from  this 
embarrassment,  and  where  the  relief  will  be  direct  and  visi- 
ble, and  capable  of  immediate  operation. 

In  the  first  place,  then,  the  poor-rates  are  a  direct  tax 
which  every  housekeeper  feels,  and  who  knows  also,  to  a 
farthing,  the  sum  which  he  pays.  The  national  amount  of 
the  whole  of  the  poor-rates  is  not  positively  known,  but  can 
be  procured.  Sir  John  Sinclair,  in  his  history  of  the  Rev- 
enue, has  stated  it  at  2,100,58T£.  A  considerable  part  of 
which  is  expended  in  litigations,  in  which  the  poor,  instead 
of  being  relieved,  are  tormented.  The  expense,  however,  is 
the  same  to  the  parish,  from  whatever  cause  it  arises. 

In  Birmingham,  the  amount  of  the  poor-rates  is  fourteen 
thousand  pounds  a-year.  This,  though  a  large  sum,  is 
moderate  compared  with  the  population.  Birmingham  is 
said  to  contain  seventy  thousand  souls,  and  on  a  proportion 
of  seventy  thousand  to  fourteen  thousand  pounds  poor-rates, 
the  national  amount  of  poor-rates,  taking  the  population  of 
England  at  seven  millions,  would  be  but  one  million  four 
hundred  thousand  pounds.  It  is,  therefore,  most  probable, 
that  the  population  of  Birmingham  is  over-rated.  Four- 
teen thousand  pounds  is  the  proportion  upon  fifty  thousand 
souls,  taking  two  millions  of  poor  rates  as  the  national 
amount. 

Be  it,  however,  what  it  may,  it  is  no  other,  than  the  con- 
sequence of  the  excessive  burden  of  taxes,  for,  at  the  time 
when  the  taxes  were  very  low,  the  poor  were  able  to  main- 
tain themselves  •  and  there  were  no  poor-rates.*  In  the 
present  state  of  things,  a  laboring  man,  with  a  wife  and  two 
or  three  children,  does  not  pay  less  than  between  seven  and 
eight  pounds  a-year  in  taxes.  He  is  not  sensible  of  this, 
because  it  is  disguised  to  him  in  the  articles  which  he  buys, 
and  he  thinks  only  of  their  dearness ;  but  as  the  taxes  take 
from  him,  at  least,  a  fourth  part  of  his  yearly  earnings,  he 

*  Poor-rates  began  about  the  time  of  Henry  VIII.  when  taxe..  begaii  to  in 
crease,  and  they  have  increased  as  the  taxes  increased  ever  since. 


SIGHTS   O7  MAH.  181 

ta  consequently  disabled  from  providing  for  a  family,  espe- 
cially if  himself,  or  any  of  them,  are  afflicted  with  sickness. 

The  first  step,  therefore,  of  practical  relief,  would  be  to 
abolish  the  poor-rates  entirely,  and,  in  lieu  thereof,  to  make 
a  remission  of  taxes  to  the  poor  to  double  the  amount  of  the 
present  poor-rates,  viz.  four  millions  annually  out  of  the  sur- 
plus taxes.  By  this  measure,  the  poor  would  be  benefited 
two  millions,  and  the  housekeepers  two  millions.  This  alone 
would  be  equal  to  the  reduction  of  one  hundred  and  twenty 
millions  of  the  national  debt,  and  consequently  equal  to  the 
whole  expense  of  the  American  war. 

It  will  then  remain  to  be  considered  which  is  the  most 
effectual  mode  of  distributing  the  remission  of  four  millions. 

It  is  easily  seen,  that  the  poor  are  generally  composed  of 
large  families  of  children,  and  old  people  unable  to  labor. 
If  these  two  classes  are  provided  for,  the  remedy  will  so  far 
reach  to  the  full  extent  of  the  case,  that  what  remains  will 
be  incidental,  and,  in  a  great  measure,  fall  within  the  com- 
pass of  benefit  clubs,  which,  though  of  humble  invention, 
merit  to  be  ranked  among  the  best  of  modern  institutions. 

Admitting  England  to  contain  seven  millions  of  souls  ;  if 
one  fifth  thereof  are  of  that  class  of  poor  which  need  sup- 
port, the  'number  will  be  one  million  tour  hundred  thousand. 
Of  this  number,  one  hundred  and  forty  thousand  will  be 
aged  and  poor,  as  will  be  hereafter  shown,  and  for  which  a 
distinct  provision  will  be  proposed. 

There  will  then  remain  one  million  two  hundred  and  sixty 
thousand,  which,  at  five  souls  to  each  family,  amount  to  two 
hundred  and  fifty-two  thousand  families,  rendered  poor  from 
the  expense  of  children  and  the  weight  of  taxes. 

The  number  of  children  under  fourteen  years  of  age,  in 
each  of  those  families,  will  be  found  to  be  five  to  every  two 
families ;  some  having  two,  others  three ;  some  one,  and 
others  four ;  some  none,  and  others  five ;  but  it  rarely  hap- 
pens that  more  than  five  are  under  fourteen  years  of  age, 
and  after  this  age  they  are  capable  of  service,  or  of  being 
apprenticed. 

Allowing  five  children  (under  fourteen  years)  to  every  two 
families, 

The  number  of  children  will  be 080,000 

The  number  of  parents,  were  they  all  living,  would  be     .        .       004,000 

It  is  certain  that  if  the  children  are  provided  for,  the 
parents  are  relieved  of  consequences,  because  it  is  from 


182  SIGHTS  OF  MAU. 

the  expense  of  bringing  up  children  that  their  poverty 
ari&es. 

Having  thus  ascertained  the  greatest  number  that  can  be 
supposed  to  need  support  on  account  of  young  families,  I 
proceed  to  the  mode  of  relief,  or  distribution,  which  is, 

To  pay  as  a  remission  of  taxes  to  every  poor  family,  out 
of  the  surplus  taxes,  and  in  room  of  poor-rates,  four  pounds 
a  year  for  every  child  under  fourteen  years  of  age ;  enjoining 
the  parents  of  such  children  to  send  them  to  school,  to  learn 
reading,  writing,  and  common  arithmetic ;  the  ministers  of 
every  parish,  of  every  denomination,  to  certify  jointly  to  an 
office,  for  this  purpose,  that  the  duty  is  performed. 

The  amount  of  this  expense  will  be,  ibr  six  hundred  and 
thirty  thousand  children,  at  4:1.  each  per  ann.  2,520,000?. 

By  adopting  this  method,  not  only  the  poverty  of  the 
parents  will  be  relieved,  but  ignorance  will  be  banished  from 
the  rising  generation,  and  the  number  of  poor  will  hereafter 
become  less,  because  their  abilities,  by  the  aid  of  education, 
will  be  greater.  Many  a  youth,  with  good  natural  genius, 
who  is  apprenticed  to  a  mechanical  trade,  such  as  a  carpen- 
ter, wheelwright,  blacksmith,  &c.,  is  prevented  getting  for  • 
ward  the  whole  of  his  life,  from  the  want  of  a  little  common 
education  when  a  boy. 

I  now  proceed  to  the  case  of  the  aged. 

I  divide  age  into  two  classes.  1st,  the  approach  of  old 
age,  beginning  at  fifty :  2d,  old  age,  commencing  at  sixty. 

At  fifty,  though  the  mental  faculties  of  man  are  in  full 
vigor,  and  his  judgment  better  than  at  any  preceding  date, 
the  bodily  powers  are  on  the  decline.  He  cannot  bear  the 
same  quantity  of  fatigue  as  at  an  earlier  period.  He  begins 
to  earn  less,  and  is  less  capable  of  enduring  the  wind  and 
weather  ;  and  in  those  retired  employments  where  much  sight 
is  required,  he  fails  apace,  and  feels  himself  like  an  old-horse, 
beginning  to  be  turned  adrift. 

At  sixty,  his  labor  ought  to  be  over,  at  least  from  direct 
necessity.  It  is  painful  to  see  old  age  working  itself  to 
death,  in  what  are  called  civilized  countries,  for  its  daily 
bread. 

To  form  some  judgment  of  the  number  of  those  above 
fifty  years  of  age,  I  have  several  tunes  counted  the  persons 
I  met  in  the  streets  of  London,  men,  women,  and  children, 
and  have  generally  found  that  the  average  is  one  in  about 
sixteen  or  seventeen.  If  it  be  said  that  aged  persons  do  not 
come  much  into  the  streets,  so  neither  do  infants ;  and  a 


RIGHTS   OF   MAN.  183 

great  proportion  of  grown  children  are  in  schools,  and  in  the 
work-shops  as  apprentices.  Taking  then  sixteen  for  a  divi- 
sor, the  whole  number  of  persons,  in  England,  of  fifty  years 
and  upwards,  of  both  sexes,  rich  and  poor,  will  be  four  hun- 
dred and  twenty  thousand. 

The  persons  to  be  provided  for  out  of  this  gross  number 
will  be,  husbandmen,  common  laborers,  journeymen  of  every 
trade,  and  their  wives,  sailors,  and  disbanded  soldiers,  worn 
out  servants  of  both  sexes,  and  poor  widows. 

There  will  be  also  a  considerable  number  of  middling 
tradesmen,  who,  having  lived  decently  in  the  former  part  of 
life,  begin,  as  age  approaches,  to  lose  their  business,  and  at 
last  fall  into  decay. 

Besides  these,  there  will  be  constantly  thrown  off  from  the 
revolutions  of  that  wheel,  which  no  man  can  stop,  nor  regu- 
late, a  number  from  every  class  of  life  connected  with  com- 
merce and  adventure. 

To  provide  for  all  those  accidents,  and  whatever  else  may 
befall,  I  take  the  number  of  persons,  who  at  one  time  or 
other  of  their  lives,  after  fifty  years  of  age,  may  feel  it  ne- 
cessary or  comfortable  to  be  better  supported,  than  they  can 
support  themselves,  and  that  not  as  a  matter  of  grace  and 
favor,  but  of  right,  at  one  third  of  the  whole  number,  which 
is  one  hundred  and  forty  thousand,  as  stated  p.  181,  and 
for  whom  a  distinct  provision  was  proposed  to  be  made. 
If  there  be  more,  society,  notwithstanding  the  show  and 
pomposity  of  government,  is  in  a  deplorable  condition  in 
England. 

Of  this  one  hundred  and  forty  thousand,  I  take  one  half, 
seventy  thousand,  to  be  of  the  age  of  fifty  and  under  sixty, 
and  the  other  half  to  be  sixty  years  and  upwards. — Having 
thus  ascertained  the  probable  proportion  01  the  number  of 
agedf  I  proceed  to  the  mode  of  rendering  their  condition 
comfortable,  which  is, 

To  pay  to  every  such  person  of  the  age  of  fifty  years,  and 
until  ne  shall  arrive  at  the  age  of  sixty,  the  sum  of  six 
pounds  per  ann.  out  of  the  surplus  taxes ;  and  ten  pounds 
per  ann.  during  life,  after  the  age  of  sixty.  The  expense  of 
which  will  be, 

Seventy  thousand  persona  at  6/.  per  ann.  420,000& 

Seventy  thousand  persons  at  101.  per  ann.  700,000 

1,120,000* 

This  support,  as  already  remarked,  is  not  of  the  nature  of 


184  EIGHTS   OF   MAST. 

charity,  but  of  a  right.  Every  person  in  England,  male  and 
female,  pays  on  an  average  in  taxes,  two  pounds  eight  shil- 
lings and  six  pence  per  ann.  from  the  day  of  his  (or  her) 
birth  ;  and  if  the  expense  of  collection  be  added,  he  pays  two 
pounds  eleven  shillings  and  sixpence  ;  consequently,  at  the 
end  of  fifty  years,  he  has  paid  one  hundred  and  twenty- 
eight  pounds  fifteen  shillings;  and  at  sixty,  one  hundred 
and  fifty-four  pounds  ten  shillings.  Converting,  therefore, 
his  (or  her)  individual  tax  into  a  tontine,  the  money  he  shall 
receive  after  fifty  years,  is  but  little  more  than  the  legal  in- 
terest of  the  net  money  he  has  paid  ;  the  rest  is  made  up 
from  those  whose  circumstances  do  not  require  them  to 
draw  such  support,  and  the  capital  in  both  cases  defrays  the 
expenses  of  government.  It  is  on  this  ground  that  I  have 
extended  the  probable  claims  to  one  third  of  the  number  of 
aged  persons  in  the  nation.  —  Is  it  then  better  that  the  lives 
of  one  hundred  and  forty  thousand  aged  persons  be  rendered 
comfortable,  or  that  a  million  a-year  of  public  money  be  ex- 
pended on  any  one  individual,  and  he  often  of  the  most 
worthless  and  insignificant  character?  Let  reason  and  jus- 
tice, let  honor  and  humanity,  let  even  hypocrisy,  syco- 
phancy, and  Mr.  Burke,  let  George,  let  Louis,  Leopold, 
Frederic,  Catherine,  Cornwallis,  or  Tippoo  Saib,  answer  the 
question.* 

The  sum  thus  remitted  to  the  poor  will  be, 

To  two  hundred  and  fifty-two  thousand  poor  families,  containing 

sir  hundred  and  thirty  thousand  children,  .  .  .  .  2,520,000/, 
To  one  hundred  and  forty  thousand  aged  persons,  .  .  1,120,000 

S,640,000/. 

*  Reckoning  the  taxes  by  families,  five  to  a  family,  each  ft  .nily  pays  on  an 
average  122.  17s.  and  Qd.  per  ann.  to  this  sum  are  to  be  add*i  the  poor-rates. 
Though  all  pay  taxes  in  the  articles  they  consume,  all  do  i,ot  pay  poor^ates. 
About  two  millions  are  exempted,  some  as  not  being  housekeepers,  others  as 
not  being  able,  and  the  poor  themselves  who  receive  the  relief.  The  average 
therefore  of  poor-rates  on  the  remaining  number,  is  forty  shillings  for  every 
family  of  five  persons,  which  makes  the  whole  average  amount  of  taxes  and 
rates,  14:1.  17s.  6d.  —  for  six  persons,  111.  17a.  —  for  seven  persons,  20/.  16s.  6d. 

The  average  of  taxes  in  America,  under  the  new  or  representative  system  of 
government,  including  the  interest  of  the  debt  contracted  in  the  war,  and 
taking  the  population  at  four  millions  of  souls,  which  it  now  amounts  to,  and 
is  daily  increasing,  is  five  shillings  per  head,  men,  women,  and  children.  Th« 
difference,  therefore,  between  the  two  governments,  is  as  under  : 


England. 

For  a  family  of  five  persons  14Z.  17«.  6dl  I/.    6t.  OdL 

For  a  family  of  six  persona  17     17     0    -  1     10    0 

For  a  family  of  seven  persons          20166  1150 


4IOHT8   OF  MAN.  185 

There  will  then  remain  three  hundred  and  sixty  thousand 
pounds  out  of  the  four  millions,  part  of  which  may  be  ap- 
plied as  follows : 

After  all  the  above  cases  are  provided  for,  there  will  still 
be  a  number  of  families  who,  though  not  properly  of  the 
class  of  poor,  yet  find  it  difficult  to  give  education  to  their 
children ;  and  such  children,  under  such  a  case,  would  be  in 
a  worse  condition  than  if  their  parents  were  actually  poor. 
A  nation  under  a  well  regulated  government,  should  permit 
none  to  remain  uninstructed.  It  is  monarchical  and  aristo- 
cratical  governments  only  that  require  ignorance  for  their 
support. 

Suppose  then  four  hundred  thousand  children  to  be  in  this 
condition,  which  is  a  greater  number  than  ought  to  be  sup- 
posed, after  the  provisions  already  made,  the  method  wul 

To  allow  for  each  of  those  children  ten  shillings  a-year  for 
the  expenses  of  schooling,  for  six  years  each,  which  will  give 
them  six  months  schooling  each  year,  and  half  a  crown 
a-year  for  paper  and  spelling  books. 

The  expense  of  this  will  be  annually*  250,0002. 

There  will  then  remain  one  hundred  and  ten  thousand 
pounds. 

Notwithstanding  the  great  modes  of  relief  which  the  best 
instituted  and  best  principled  government  may  devise,  there 
will  still  be  a  number  of  smaller  cases,  which  it  is  good 
policy  as  well  as  beneficence  in  a  nation  to  consider. 

Were  twenty  shillings  to  be  given  to  every  woman  imme- 
diately on  the  birth  of  a  child,  who  should  make  the  demand, 
and  none  will  make  it  whose  circumstances  do  not  require 
it,  it  might  relieve  a  great  deal  of  instant  distress. 

There  are  about  two  hundred  thousand  births  yearly  in 
England  ;  and  if  claimed  by  one  fourth,  the  amount  would 
be  50,OOOZ. 

*  Public  schools  do  not  answer  the  general  purpose  of  the  poor.  They  are 
chiefly  in  corporation-towns,  from  which  the  country  towns  and  villages  are 
excluded — or  if  admitted,  the  distance  occasions  a  great  loss  of  time.  Educa- 
tion, to  be  useful  to  the  poor,  should  be  on  the  spot — and  the  best  method,  I 
believe,  to  accomplish  this,  is  to  enable  the  parents  to  pay  the  expense  them* 
selves.  There  are  always  persons  of  both  sexes  to  be  found  in  every  village, 
especially  when  growing  into  years,  capable  of  such  an  undertaking.  Twenty 
children,  at  ten  shillings  each  (and  that  not  more  than  six  months  in  each 
year,)  would  be  as  much  as  some  livings  amount  to  in  the  remote  parts  of 
England — and  there  are  often  distressed  clergymen's  widows  to  whom  such 
an  income  would  be  acceptable.  Whatever  is  given  on  this  account  to  child* 
ren  answers  two  purposes,  to  them  it  is  education,  to  those  who  educate  them 
H  is  a  livelihood 


186  BIGHTS  OF  MAN. 

And  twenty  shillings  to  every  new  married  couple  who 
should  claim  in  like  manner.  This  would  not  exceed  the 
sum  of  20,0002. 

Also  twenty  thousand  pounds  to  be  appropriated  to  de- 
fray the  funeral  expenses  of  persons,  who,  travelling  for 
work,  may  die  at  a  distance  from  their  friends.  By  reliev- 
ing parishes  from  this  charge,  the  sick  stranger  will  be  bet- 
ter treated. 

I  shall  finish  this  part  of  my  subject  with  a  plan  adapted 
to  the  particular  condition  of  a  metropolis,  sucn  as  London. 

Cases  are  continually  occurring  in  a  metropolis  different 
from  those  which  occur  in  the  country,  and  for  which  a  dif- 
ferent, or  rather  an  additional  mode  of  relief  is  necessary. 
In  the  country,  even  in  large  towns,  people  have  a  know- 
ledge of  each  other,  and  distress  never  rises  to  that  extreme 
height  it  sometimes  does  in  a  metropolis.  There  is  no  such 
thing  in  the  country  as  persons,  in  the  literal  sense  of  the 
word,  starved  to  death,  or  dying  with  cold  for  the  want  of 
a  lodging.  Yet  such  cases,  and  others  equally  as  miserable, 
happen  in  London. 

Many  a  youth  comes  up  to  London  fall  of  expectations, 
and  little  or  no  money,  and  unless  he  gets  employment  he  is 
already  half  undone  ;  and  boys  bred  up  in  London  without 
any  means  of  a  livelihood,  and,  as  it  often  happens,  of  disso- 
lute parents,  are  in  a  still  worse  condition,  and  servants  long 
out  of  place  are  not  much  better  off.  In  short,  a  world  01 
little  cases  are  continually  arising,  which  busy  or  affluent 
life  knows  not  of,  to  open  the  first  door  to  distress.  Hunger 
is  not  among  the  postponable  wants,  and  a  day,  even  a  few 
hours,  in  such  a  condition,  is  often  the  crisis  of  a  life  of 


These  circumstances,  which  are  the  general  cause  of  the 
little  thefts  and  pilferings  that  lead  to  greater,  may  be  pre- 
vented. There  yet  remain  twenty  thousand  pounds  out  of 
the  four  millions  of  surplus  taxes,  which,  with  another  fund 
hereafter  to  be  mentioned,  amounting  to  about  twenty  thou- 
sand pounds  more,  cannot  be  better  applied  than  to  this 
purpose.  The  plan  then  will  be, 

1st,  To  erect  two  or  more  buildings,  or  take  some  already 
erected,  capable  of  containing  at  least  six  thousand  persons, 
and  to  have  in  each  of  these  places  as  many  kinds  of  em- 
ployment as  can  be  contrived,  so  that  every  person  who 
shall  come  may  find  something  which  he  or  she  can  do. 

2d,  To  receive  all  who  shall  come,  without  inquiring  who 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN.  187 

or  what  they  are.  The  only  condition  to  be,  that  for  so 
much  or  so  many  hours'  work,  each  person  shall  receive  so 
many  meals  of  wholesome  food,  ana  a  warm  lodging,  at 
least  as  good  as  a  barrack.  That  a  certain  portion  of  what 
each  person's  work  shall  be  worth  shall  be  reserved,  and 
given  to  him,  or  her,  on  their  going  away  ;  and  that  each 
person  shall  stay  as  long,  or  as  short  time,  or  come  as  often 
as  he  chooses,  on  these  conditions. 

If  each  person  staid  three  months,  it  would  assist  bv  rota- 
tion twenty-four  thousand  persons  annually,  though  the  real 
number,  at  all  times,  would  be  but  six  thousand.  By 
establishing  an  asylum  of  this  kind,  such  persons,  to  whom 
temporary  distresses  occur,  would  have  an  opportunity  to 
recruit  themselves,  and  be  enabled  to  look  out  for  better 
employment. 

Allowing  that  their  labor  paid  but  one  half  the  expense 
of  supporting  them,  after  reserving  a  portion  of  their  earn- 
ings for  themselves,  the  sum  of  forty  thousand  pounds  addi- 
tional would  defray  all  other  charges  for  even  a  greater 
number  than  six  thousand. 

The  fund  very  properly  convertible  to  this  purpose,  in 
addition  to  the  twenty  thousand  pounds,  remaining  of  the 
former  fund,  will  be  the  produce  of  the  tax  upon  coals,  and 
BO  iniquitously  and  wantonly  applied  to  the  support  of  the 
duke  of  Richmond.  It  is  horrid  that  any  man,  more  espe- 
cially at  the  price  coals  now  are,  should  live  on  the  distresses 
of  a  community ;  and  any  government  permitting  such  an 
abuse  deserves  to  be  dissolved.  This  fund  is  said  to  be  about 
twenty  thousand  pounds  per  annum. 

I  shall  now  conclude  this  plan  with  enumerating  the  seve- 
ralparticulars,  and  then  proceed  to  other  matters. 

The  enumeration  is  as  follows  : 

1st,  Abolition  of  two  millions  poor-rates. 

2d,  Provision  for  two  hundred  and  fifty-two  thousand  poor 
families. 

3d,  Education  for  one  million  and  thirty  thousand  child- 
ren. 

4th,  Comfortable  provision  for  one  hundred  and  forty 
thousand  aged  persons. 

5th,  Donation  of  twenty  shillings  each  for  fifty  thousand 
births. 

6th,  Donation  of  twenty  shillings  each  for  twenty  thou- 
sand marriages. 

7th.  Allowance  of  twenty  thousand  pounds  for  the  funeral 


188  RIGHTS   01    MAN. 

expenses  of  persons  travelling  for  work,  and  dying  at  a  dit- 
tance  from  their  friends. 

8th,  Employment,  at  all  times,  for  the  casual  poor  in  the 
cities  of  London  and  Westminster. 

By  the  operation  of  this  plan,  the  poor  laws,  those  instru- 
ments of  civil  torture,  will  be  superseded,  and  the  wasteful 
expense  of  litigation  prevented.  The  hearts  of  the  humane 
will  not  be  shocked  by  ragged  and  hungry  children,  and 
persons  of  seventy  and  eighty  years  of  age  begging  for 
bread.  The  dying  poor  will  not  be  dragged  from  place  to 
place  to  breathe  their  last,  as  a  reprisal  of  parish  upon 
parish.  Widows  will  have  a  maintenance  for  their  child- 
ren, and  not  be  carted  away,  on  the  death  of  their  husbands, 
like  culprits  and  criminals ;  and  children  will  no  longer  be 
considered  as  increasing  the  distress  of  their  parents.  The 
haunts  of  the  wretched  will  be  known,  because  it  will  be  to 
their  advantage ;  and  the  number  of  petty  crimes,  the  off- 
spring of  distress  and  poverty,  will  be  lessened.  The  poor5 
as  well  as  the  rich,  will  then  be  interested  in  the  support  of 
government,  and  the  cause  and  apprehension  of  riots  and 
tumults  will  cease.  Ye  who  sit  in  ease,  and  solace  your- 
selves in  plenty,  and  such  there  are  in  Turkey  and  Russia, 
as  well  as  in  England,  and  who  say  to  yourselves,  "  Are  we 
not  well  off,"  have  ye  thought  of  these  things  ?  When  ye 
do,ye  will  cease  to  speak  and  feel  for  yourselves  alone. 

The  plan  is  easy  in  practice.  It  does  not  embarrass  trade 
by  a  sudden  interruption  in  the  order  of  taxes,  but  effects 
the  relief  by  changing  the  application  of  them ;  and  the 
money  necessary  for  the  purpose,  can  be  drawn  from  the 
excise  collections,  which  are  made  eight  times  a-year  in 
every  market  town  in  England. 

Having  now  arranged  and  concluded  this  subject,  I  pro- 
ceed to  the  next. 

Taking  the  present  current  expenses  at  seven  millions  and 
an  half,  which  is  the  least  amount  they  are  now  at,  there 
will  remain  (after  the  sum  of  one  million  and  an  half  be 
taken  for  the  new  current  expenses,  and  four  millions  for  the 
beforementioned  service)  the  sum  of  two  millions,  part  of 
which  to  be  applied  as  follows : 

Though  fleets  and  armies,  by  an  alliance  with  France, 
will,  in  a  great  measure,  become  useless,  yet  the  persons 
who  have  devoted  themselves  to  those  services,  and  have 
thereby  unfitted  themselves  for  other  lines  of  life,  are  not  tu 
be  sufferers  by  the  means  that  make  others  happy  — They 


BIGHTS   OF  MAN.  189 

are  a  different  description  of  men  to  those  who  form  or  hang 
about  a  court. 

A  part  of  the  army  will  remain  at  least  for  some  years, 
and  also  of  the  navy,  for  which  a  provision  is  already  made, 
in  the  former  part  of  this  plan,  of  one  million,  which  is 
almost  half  a  million  more  than  the  peace  establishment  of 
the  army  and  navy  in  the  prodigal  times  of  Charles  II. 

Suppose  then  fifteen  thousand  soldiers  to  be  disbanded, 
and  to  allow  to  each  of  those  men  three  shillings  a  week 
during  life,  clear  of  all  deductions,  to  be  paid  in  the  same 
manner  as  the  Chelsea  college  pensioners  are  paid,  and  for 
them  to  return  to  their  trades  and  their  friends ;  and  also  to 
add  fifteen  thousand  sixpences  per  week  to  the  pay  of  the 
soldiers  who  shall  remain ;  the  annual  expense  wm  be, 

To  the  pay  of  fifteen  thousand  disbanded  soldiers,  at  three  shil- 
ling per  week, «...       117,000*. 

Additional  pay  to  the  remaining  soldiers, 19,600 

Suppose  that  the  pay  to  the  officers  of  the  disbanded  corps  be  of 
the  same  amount  as  the  sum  allowed  to  the  men,        .        .        .     117,000 

263.BOO/. 

To  prevent  bulky  estimations,  admit  the  same  sum  to  the  disbanded 
nary  as  to  the  army,  and  the  same  increase  of  pay,        .        .          253,5001. 

Total,  607,000*. 

Every  year  some  part  of  this  sum  of  half  a  million  (I  omit 
the  odd  seven  thousand  pounds,  for  the  purpose  of  keeping 
the  account  unembarrassed)  will  fall  in,  and  the  whole  of  it 
in  time,  as  it  is  on  the  ground  of  life  annuities,  except  the 
increased  pay  of  thirty-nine  thousand  pounds.  As  it  falls 
in,  a  part  of  the  taxes  may  be  taken  on ;  for  instance,  when 
thirty  thousand  pounds  fall  in,  the  duty  on  hops  may  be 
wholly  taken  off ;  and  as  other  parts  fall  in,  the  duties  on 
candles  and  soap  may  be  lessened,  till  at  last  they  will  totally 
cease. — There  now  remains  at  least  one  million  and  a  half  of 
surplus  taxes. 

The  tax  on  houses  and  windows  is  one  of  those  direct 
taxes,  which,  like  the  poor-rates,  is  not  confounded  with  trade ; 
and  when  taken  off,  the  relief  will  be  instantly  felt.  This  tax 
falls  heavy  on  the  middle  class  of  people. 

^the  amount  of  this  tax  by  the  returns  of  1T88,  was, 

i.     *  4 

Houses  and  windows  by  the  act  of  1766        .        .        .           886,459     11     7 
Do.  do       by  the  act  of  1779        .        .        .           180,739     14    5) 

Total  616.199       ft     OJ 


190  RIGHTS   OF  MAN. 

If  this  tax  be  struck  off,  there  will  then  remain  about  one 
million  of  surplus  taxes,  and  as  it  is  always  proper  to  keep 
a  sum  in  reserve,  for  incidental  matters,  it  may  be  best  not 
to  extend  reductions  further,  in  the  first  instance,  but  to  con- 
sider what  may  be  accomplished  by  other  modes  of  reform. 

Among  the  taxes  most  heavily  felt  is  the  commutation 
tax.  I  shall,  therefore,  offer  a  plan  for  its  abolition,  by  sub- 
stituting another  in  its  place,  which  will  effect  three  oojects 
at  once : 

1st.  That  of  removing  the  burden  to  where  it  can  best  be 
borne. 

2d.  Kestoring  justice  among  families  by  distribution  of 
property. 

3d.  Extirpating  the  overgrown  influence  arising  from  the 
unnatural  law  of  primogeniture,  and  which  is  one  of  the  prin- 
cipal sources  of  corruption  at  elections. 

The  amount  of  the  commutation  tax  by  the  returns  of  1788, 
was  771,6572. 

When  taxes  are  proposed,  the  country  is  amused  by  the 
plausible  language  of  taxing  luxuries.  One  thing  is  called 
a  luxury  at  one  time,  and  something  else  at  another ;  but 
the  real  luxury  does  not  consist  in  the  article,  but  in  the 
means  of  procuring  it,  and  this  is  always  kept  out  of  sight. 

I  know  not  why  any  plant  or  herb  of  the  field  should  be  a 
greater  luxury  in  one  country  than  another,  but  an  over- 
grown estate  in  either  is  a  luxury  at  all  times,  and,  as  such, 
is  the  proper  object  of  taxation.  It  is,  therefore,  right  to 
take  those  kind  tax-making  gentlemen  up  on  their  own 
word,  and  argue  on  the  principle  themselves  have  laid  down, 
that  of  taxing  luxuries.  If  they,  or  their  champion,  Mr. 
Iforke,  who,  I  fear,  is  growing  out  of  date  like  the  man  in 
armor,  can  prove  that  an  estate  of  twenty,  thii  ty,  or  forty 
thousand  pounds  a-year  is  not  a  luxury,  I  will  give  up  the 
argument. 

Admitting  that  any  annual  sum,  say,  for  instance,  one 
thousand  pounds,  is  necessary  or  sufficient  for  the  support 
of  a  family,  consequently  the  second  thousand  is  of  the  nature 
of  a  luxury,  the  third  still  more  so,  and  by  proceeding  on, 
we  shall  at  last  arrive  at  a  sum  that  may  not  improperly  bfe 
called  a  prohibitable  luxury.  It  would  be  impolitic  to  set 
bounds  to  property  acquired  by  industry,  and  therefore  it  is 
right  to  place  the  prohibition  beyond  the  probable  acquisi 
tion  to  which  industry  can  extend ;  hut  there  ought  to  be  a 
limit  to  property,  or  me  accumulation  of  it  by  bequest.  It 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN.  191 

should  pass  in  some  other  line.  The  richest  in  every  nation 
have  poor  relations,  and  those  often  very  near  in  consan- 
guinity. 

The  following  table  of  progressive  taxation  is  constructed 
on  the  above  principles,  and  as  a  substitute  for  the  commu- 
tation tax.  It  will  reach  the  point  of  prohibition  by  a  regular 
operation,  and  thereby  supersede  the  aristocratical  law  of 
primogeniture. 

TABLE  L 

A  tax  on  all  estates  of  the  clear  yearly  value  of  fifty 
pounds,  after  deducting  the  land  tax,  and  up 

8d  per  pound. 


To  500/. 

From  600  to  1000    . 
On  the  2d  thousand 
On  the  3d  ditto 
On  tke  4th  ditto 


6 


1     « 


And  so  on,  adding  1«.  per  pound  on  every  additional  thou- 
sand. 

At  the  twenty-third  thousand  the  tax  becomes  twenty  shil- 
lings in  the  pound,  and,  consequently,  every  thousand  be- 
yond that  sum,  can  produce  no  profit  but  by  dividing  the 
estate.  Yet,  formidable  as  this  tax  appears,  it  will  not,  I 
believe,  produce  so  much  as  the  commutation  tax ;  should  it 
produce  more,  it  ought  to  be  lowered  to  that  amount  upon 
estates  under  two  or  three  thousand  a-year. 

On  small  and  middling  estates  it  is  lighter  (as  it  is  intended 
to  be)  than  the  commutation  tax.  It  is  not  till  after  seven 
or  eight  thousand  a-year,  that  it  begins  to  be  heavy.  The 
object  is  not  so  much  the  produce  01  the  tax  as  the  justice 
of  the  measure.  The  aristocracy  has  screened  itself  too 
much,  and  this  serves  to  restore  a  part  of  the  lost  equilibrium. 

As  an  instance  of  its  screening  itself,  it  is  only  necessary 
to  look  back  to  the  first  establishment  of  the  excise  laws,  at 
what  is  called  the  revolution,  or  the  coming  of  Charles  II. 
The  aristocratical  interest  then  in  power,  commuted  the  feu- 
dal services  itself  was  under,  by  laying  a  tax  on  beer  brewed 
for  sale  /  that  is,  they  compounded,  with  Charles  for  an  ex- 
emption from  those  services  for  themselves  and  their  heirs, 
by  a  tax  to  be  paid  by  other  people.  The  aristocracy  do 
not  purchase  beer  brewed  for  sale,  but  brew  their  own  beer 
free  of  the  duty,  and  if  any  commutation  at  that  time  was 
necessary,  it  ought  to  have  been  at  the  expense  of  those  foi 


192  EIGHTS   OF  MAJT. 

whom  the  exemptions  from  those  services  were  intended  ;* 
instead  of  which,  it  was  thrown  on  an  entire  different  class 
of  men.  ^ 

But  the  chief  object  of  this  progressive  tax  (besides  the 
justice  of  rendering  taxes  more  equal  than  they  are)  is,  as 
already  stated,  to  extirpate  the  overgrown  influence  arising 
from  the  unnatural  law  of  primogeniture,  and  which  is  one 
of  the  principal  sources  of  corruption  at  elections. 

It  would  be  attended  with  no  good  consequences  to  inquire 
how  such  vast  estates  as  thirty,  forty,  or  fifty  thousand  a- 
year  could  commence,  and  that  at  a  time  when  commerce 
and  manufactures  were  not  in  a  state  to  admit  of  such  acqui- 
sitions. Let  it  be  sufficient  to  remedy  the  evil  by  putting 
them  in  a  condition  of  descending  again  to  the  community 
by  the  quiet  means  of  apportioning  them  among  all  the 
heirs  and  heiresses  of  those  families.  This  will  be  the  more 
necessary,  because  hitherto  the  aristocracy  have  quartered 
their  younger  children  and  connexions  upon  the  public,  in 
useless  posts,  places  and  offices,  which,  when  abolished,  wil] 
leave  them  destitute,  unless  the  law  of  primogeniture  be  also 
abolished  or  superseded. 

A  progressive  tax  will,  in  a  great  measure,  effect  this  ob- 
ject, and  that  as  a  matter  of  interest  to  the  parties  most 
immediately  concerned,  as  will  be  seen  by  tne  following 
table ;  which  shows  the  nett  produce  upon  every  estate,  after 
subtracting  the  tax.  By  this  it  will  appear,  that  after  an 
estate  exceeds  thirteer  or  fourteen  thousand  a-year,  the  re- 


BIGHTS   OF  KAN. 
TABLE  II. 


193 


Showing  the  nett  produce  of  every  estate  from  one  thou- 
'  tand  to  twenty-three  thousand  pounas  a-year. 


No.  of  thousand* 
per  ann. 

Total  tax  subtracted. 

Nett  product. 

10002. 

Hi, 

979/. 

2000 

59 

1941 

8000 

109 

2891 

400C 

184 

8861 

5000 

284 

4716 

6000 

484 

5566 

7000 

634 

6366 

8000 

880 

7120 

9000 

1180 

7820 

10,000 

1530 

8470 

11,000 

1980 

9070 

12,000 

2380 

9620 

18,000 

2880 

10,120 

14,000 

8430 

10,670 

15,000 

4030 

10,970 

16,000 

•4680 

11,820 

17,000 

6380 

11,620 

18,000 

6130 

11,870 

19,000 

6880 

12,170 

20,000 

7780 

12,220 

21,000 

8680 

12,320 

22,000 

9630 

12,870 

23,000 

10,630 

12,870 

N.  B.  The  odd  shillings  are  dropped  with  this  table. 

According  to  this  table,  an  estate  cannot  produce  more 
than  12,3707.  clear  of  the  land  tax  and  the  progressive  tax, 
and  therefore  the  dividing  such  estates  will  follow  as  a  rnat- 
'ter  of  family  interest.  An  estate  of  23,OOOZ.  a-year,  divided 
into  five  estates  of  four  thousand  each  and  one  of  three,  will 
be  charged  only  1129Z.  which  is  but  five  per  cent.,  but  if 
held  by  anv  one  possessor,  will  be  charged  10,630£. 

Although  an  inquiry  into  the  origin  of  those  estates  be 
onnecessary,  the  continuation  of  them  in  their  present  state 
is  another  subject.  It  is  a  matter  of  national  concern.  As 
hereditary  estates,  the  law  has  created  the  evil,  and  it  ought 
also  to  provide  the  remedy.  Primogeniture  ought  to  be 
abolished,  not  only  because  it  is  unnatural  and  unjust,  but 
because  me  countrv  suffers  by  its  operation.  By  cutting  off 
(as  before  observed)  the  younger  children  from  their  proper 
portion  ol*  inheritance,  the  public  is  loaded  with  the  expense 


194  EIGHTS  OP  MAN. 

of  maintaining  them ;  and  the  freedom  of  elections  violated 
by  the  overbearing  influence  which  this  unjust  monopol y  of 
family  property  produces.  Nor  is  this  is  an.  It  occasions  a 
waste  of  national  property.  A  considerable  part  of  the  land 
of  the  country  is  rendered  unproductive,  by  the  great  extent 
of  parks  and  chases  which  this  law  serves  to  keep  up,  and 
this  at  a  time  when  the  annual  production  of  grain  is  not 
equal  to  the  national  consumption.* — In  short,  the  evils  of 
the  aristocratical  system  are  so  great  and  numerous,  so  incon- 
sistent with  every  thing  that  is  just,  wise,  natural  and  bene- 
5cent,  that  when  they  are  considered,  there  ought  not  to  be 
a  doubt  that  many,  who  are  now  classed  under  that  descrip- 
tion, will  wish  to  see  such  a  system  abolished. 

What  pleasure  can  they  derive  from  contemplating  the 
exposed  condition,  and  almost  certain  beggary  of  their 
younger  offspring  ?  Every  aristocratical  family  has  an  ap- 
pendage of  family  beggars  hanging  round  it,  which  in  a  few 
ages,  or  a  few  generations,  are  shook  off,  and  console  them- 
selves with  telling  their  tale  in  alms-houses,  work-houses, 
and  prisons.  This  is  the  natural  consequence  of  aristocracy. 
The  peer  and  the  beggar  are  often  of  the  same  family.  One 
extreme  produces  the  other :  to  make  one  rich  many  must 
be  made  poor ;  neither  can  the  system  be  supported  by  other 
means. 

There  are  two  classes  of  people  to  whom  the  laws  of  Eng- 
land are  particularly  hostile,  and  those  the  most  helpless ; 
younger  children,  and  the  poor.  Of  the  former  I  have  just 
spoken:  of  the  latter  I  shall  mention  one  instance  out  of  the 
many  mat  might  be  produced,  and  with  which  I  shall  close 
this  subject. 

Several  laws  are  in  existence  for  regulating  and  limiting 
workmen's  wages.  Why  not  leave  them  as  free  to  make 
their  own  bargains,  as  the  law-makers  are  to  let  their  farms 
and  houses  ?  Personal  labor  is  all  the  property  they  have. 
Why  is  that  little,  and  the  little  freedom  they  enjoy,  to  be 
infringed?  But  the  injustice  will  appear  stronger,  if  we 
consider  the  operation  and  effect  of  such  laws.  When  wages 
are  fixed  by  what  is  called  a  law,  the  legal  wages  remain 
stationary,  while  every  thing  else  is  progression;  and  as 
those  who  make  that  law,  still  continue  to  lay  on  new  taxes 
by  other  laws,  they  increase  the  expense  of  living  by  one 
law,  and  take  away  the  means  by  another. 

But  if  these  gentlemen  law-makers  and  tax-makers  thought 

*  See  the  Reports  on  the  Corn  Trade. 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN.  195 

it  righi  to  limit  the  poor  pittance  which  personal  labor  can 
produce,  and  on  which  a  whole  family  is  to  be  supported, 
they  certainly  must  feel  themselves  happily  indulged  hi  a 
limitation  on  their  own  part,  of  not  less  than  twelve  thousand 
a-year,  and  that  of  property  they  never  acquired,  (nor  proba- 
bly any  of  their  ancestors)  and  of  which  they  have  made  so 
ill  a  use. 

Having  now  finished  this  subject,  I  shall  bring  the  several 
particulars  into  one  view,  and  then  proceed  to  other  mat- 
ters. 

The  first  eight  articles  are  brought  forward  from 
p.  187. 

1.  Abolition  of  two  millions  poor-rates. 

2.  Provision  for  two  hundred  and  fifty-two  thousand  poor 
families,  at  the  rate  of  four  pounds  per  head  for  each  cnild 
under  fourteen  years  of  age ;  which,  with  the  addition  of  two 
hundred  and  fifty  thousand  pounds,  provides  also  education 
for  one  million  and  thirty  thousand  children. 

3.  Annuity  of  six  pounds  per  annum  each  for  all  poor 
persons,  decayed  tradesmen  and  others,  supposed  seventy 
thousand,  of  the  age  of  fifty  years,  and  until  sixty. 

4.  Annuity  often  pounds  each  for  life  for  all  poor  persons, 
decayed  tradesmen  and  others,  supposed  seventy  thousand, 
of  the  age  of  sixty  years. 

5.  Donation  of  twenty  shillings  each  for  fifty  thousand 
births. 

6.  Donation  of  twenty  shillings  each  for  twenty  thousand 
marriages. 

7.  Allowance  of  twenty  thousand  pounds  for  the  funeral 
expenses  of  persons  travelling  for  work,  and  dying  at  a 
distance  from  their  friends. 

8.  Employment  at  all  times  for  the  casual  poor  in  the 
cities  of  London  and  Westminister. 

Second  enumeration. 

9.  Abolition  of  the  tax  on  houses  and  windows. 

10.  Allowance  of  three  shillings  per  week  for  life  to  fifteen 
thousand  disbanded  soldiers,  and  a  proportionate  allowance 
to  the  officers  of  the  disbanded  corps. 

11.  Increase  of  pay  to  the  remaining  soldiers  of  19,5002. 
annually. 

12.  The  same  allowance  to  the  disbanded  navy,  and  the 
same  increase  of  pay,  as  to  the  army. 

13.  Abolition  of  the  commutation  tax. 

14.  Plan  of  a  progressive  tax,  operating  to  extirpate  the 


196  BIGHTS    OF   MAN. 

nniust  and  unnatural  law  of  primogeniture,  and  the  vicioui 
influence  of  the  aristocratical  system.* 

There  yet  remains,  as  already  stated,  one  million  of  surplus 
taxes.  Some  part  of  this  will  be  required  for  circumstances 
that  do  not  immediately  ^resent  themselves,  and  such  part 
as  shall  not  be  wanted,  will  admit  of  a  further  reduction  of 
taxes  equal  to  that  amount. 

Among  the  claims  that  justice  requires  to  be  made,  the 
condition  of  the  inferior  revenue-officers  will  merit  attention. 
It  is  a  reproach  to  any  government  to  waste  such  an  immen- 
sity of  revenue  in  sinecures  and  nominal  and  unnecessary 
places  and  offices,  and  not  allow  even  a  decent  livelihood  to 
those  on  whom  the  labor  falls.  The  salary  of  the  inferior 
officers  of  the  revenue  has  stood  at  the  petty  pittance  of  less 
than  fifty  pounds  a-year,  for  upwards  of  one  nundred  years. 
It  ought  to  be  seventy.  About  one  hundred  and  twenty 
thousands  pounds  applied  to  this  purpose,  will  put  all  those 
salaries  in  a  decent  condition. 

This  was  proposed  to  be  done  almost  twenty  years  ago, 
but  the  treasury  board  then  in  being,  startled  at  it,  as  it 
might  lead  to  similar  expectations  from  the  army  and  navy ; 
and  the  event  was,  that  the  king,  or  somebody  for  him, 
applied  to  parliament  to  have  his  own  salary  raised  an 
hundred  thousand  pounds  a-year,  which  being  done,  every 
thing  else  was  laid  aside. 

With  respect  to  another  class  of  men,  the  inferior  clergy, 

*  When  inquiries  are  made  into  the  condition  of  the  poor,  various  degrees 
of  distress  will  most  probably  be  found,  to  render  a  different  arrangement 
preferable  to  that  which  is  already  proposed.  Widows  with  families  will  be  in 
greater  want  than  where  there  are  husbands  living.  There  is  also  a  difference 
in  the  expense  of  living  in  different  countries — and  more  so  in  fuel. 
Suppose  fifty  thousand  extraordinary  cases,  at  the  rate  of  ten 

pounds  per  family  per  ann .          500,0002. 

100,000  families,  at  SI.  per  family  per  ann 800,000 

100,000  families,  at  11.  per      "            "  700,000 

104,000  families,  at  51.  per      "            "  520,000 

And  instead  of  ten  shillings  per  head  for  the  education  of  other 
children,  to  allow  fifty  shillings  per  family  for  that  purpose  to 
fifty  thousand  families 250,000 

2,770,000 
140,000  aged  persons  as  before, 1,120,000 

3,890,OOOJ. 

This  arrangement  amounts  to  the  same  sum  as  stated  in  p.  232,  including 
the  250,000£.  for  education :  but  it  provides  (including  the  aged  people)  f»r 
four  hundred  and  four  thousand  families,  which  is  almost  one  third  of  aU  the 
families  in  England 


EIGHTS   OF  MAN.  197 

I  forbear  to  enlarge  on  their  condition ;  but  all  partialities 
and  prejudices  for,  or  against,  different  modes  ana  forms  of 
religion  aside,  common  justice  will  determine,  whether  there 
ought  to  be  an  income  of  twenty  or  thirty  pounds  a-year  to 
one  man,  and  of  ten  thousand  to  another.  I  speak  on  this 
subject  with  the  more  freedom,  because  I  am  known  not  to 
be  a  Presbyterian  ;  and  therefore  the  cant  cry  of  court  syco- 
phants, about  church  and  meeting,  kept  up  to  amuse  and 
bewilder  the  nation,  cannot  be  raised  against  me. 

Ye  simple  men  on  both  sides  the  question,  do  you  not  see 
through  this  courtly  craft  ?  If  ye  can  be  kept  disputing  and 
wrangling  about  church  and  meeting,  ye  just  answer  the 
purpose  of  every  courtier,  who  lives  the  while  on  the  spoil 
of  the  taxes,  and  laughs  at  your  credulity. — Every  religion 
is  good  that  teaches  man  to  be  good ;  and  I  know  of  none 
that  instructs  him  to  be  bad. 

All  the  beforementioned  calculations,  suppose  only  six- 
teen millions  and  an  half  of  taxes  paid  into  the  exchequer, 
after  the  expense  of  collection  and  drawbacks  at  the  cus- 
tom-house and  excise-office  are  deducted  ;  whereas  the  sum 
paid  into  the  exchequer  is  very  nearly,  if  not  quite,  seven- 
teen millions.  The  taxes  raised  in  Scotland  and  Ireland  are 
expended  in  those  countries,  and  therefore  their  savings  will 
come  out  of  their  own  taxes :  but  if  any  part  be  paid  into 
the  English  exchequer,  it  might  be  remitted. — This  will  not 
make  one  hundred  thousand  pounds  a-year  difference. 

There  now  remains  only  the  national  debt  to  be  con- 
sidered. In  the  year  1789,  the  interest,  exclusive  of  the 
tontine,  was  9,150,1382.  How  much  the  capital  has  been 
reduced  since  that  time  the  minister  best  knows.  But  after 
paying  the  interest,  abolishing  the  tax  on  houses  and  win- 
dows, the  commutation  tax  and  the  poor-rates,  and  making 
all  the  provisions  for  the  poor,  for  the  education  of  children, 
the  support  of  the  aged,  the  disbanded  part  of  the  army  and 
navy,  and  increasing  the  pay  of  the  remainder,  there  will  be 
a  surplus  of  one  million. 

The  present  scheme  of  paying  off  the  national  debt  ap- 
pears to  me,  speaking  as  an  indifferent  person,  to  be  an  HI 
concerted,  if  not  a  fallacious  job.  The  burden  of  the  national 
debt  consists  not  in  its  being  so  many  millions,  or  so  many  hun- 
dred millions,  but  in  the  quantity  of  taxes  collected  every 
year  to  pay  the  interest.  If  this  quantity  continues  the  «une, 
the  burden  of  the  national  debt  is  the  same  to  all  intents  and 
purposes,  be  the  capital  more  or  less. — The  only  knowledge 


198  EIGHTS   OF   MAU 

which  the  public  can  have  of  the  reduction  of  the  debt,  must 
be  through  the  reduction  of  taxes  for  paying  the  interest. 
The  debt, 'therefore,  is  not  reduced  one  farthing  to  the  pub- 
lic by  all  the  millions  that  have  been  paid ;  and  it  would 
require  more  money  now  to  purchase  up  the  capital,  than 
when  the  scheme  began. 

Digressing  for  a  moment  at  this  point,  to  which  I  shall 
return  again,  I  look  back  to  the  appointment  of  Mr.  Pitt,  as 
minister. 

I  was  then  in  America.  The  war  was  over ;  and  though 
resentment  had  ceased,  memory  was  still  alive. 

When  the  news  of  the  coalition  arrived,  though  it  was  a 
matter  of  no  concern  to  me  as  a  citizen  of  America,  I  felt  it 
as  a  man.  It  had  something  in  it  which  shocked,  by  pub- 
licly sporting  with  decency,  if  not  with  principle.  It  was 
impudence  in  lord  North ;  it  was  a  want  of  firmness  in  Mr. 
Fox. 

Mr.  Pitt  was,  at  that  time,  what  may  be  called  a  maiden 
character  in  politics.  So  far  from  being  hackneyed,  he  ap- 
peared not  to  be  initiated  into  the  first  mysteries  of  court 
intrigue.  Every  thing  was  in  his  favor.  Resentment  against 
the  coalition  served  as  friendship  to  him,  and  his  ignorance 
of  vice  was  credited  for  virtue.  With  the  return  of  peace, 
commerce  and  prosperity  would  rise  of  itself;  yet  even  this 
Increase  was  thrown  to  his  account. 

When  he  came  to  the  helm,  the  storm  was  over,  and  he 
had  nothing  to  interrupt  his  course.  It  required  even 
ingenuity  to  be  wrong,  and  he  succeeded.  A  little  time 
showed  him  the  same  -  sort  of  man  as  his  predecessors  had 
been.  Instead  of  profiting  by  those  errors  which  had 
accumulated  a  burden  of  taxes  unparalleled  in  the  world,  he 
sought,  I  might  almost  say,  he  advertised  for  enemies,  and 
provoked  means  to  increase  taxation.  Aiming  at  something, 
he  knew  not  what,  he  ransacked  Europe  and  India  for  ad- 
ventures, and  abandoning  the  fair  pretensions  he  began 
with,  became  the  knight-errant  of  modern  times. 

It  is  unpleasant  to  see  character  throw  itself  away.  It  is 
more  so  to  see  one's  self  deceived.  Mr.  Pitt  had  merited 
nothing,  but  he  promised  much.  He  gave  symptoms  of  ,a 
mind  superior  to  the  meanness  and  corruption  of  courts. 
His  apparent  candor  encouraged  expectations  ;  and  the  pub- 
lic confidence,  stunned,  wearied,  and  confounded  by  a  chaos 
of  parties,  revived  and.  attached  itself  to  him.  But  mistak- 
ing, as  he  has  don*,  the  disgust  cf  the  nation  against  the 


EIGHTS   OF   MAN.  199 

coalition,  for  merit  in  himself,  he  has  rushed  into  measure*, 
which  a  man  less  supported  would  not  have  presumed  to 
act. 

All  this  seems  to  show  that  change  of  ministers  amounts 
to  nothing.  One  goes  out,  another  comes  in,  and  still  the 
same  measures,  vices,  and  extravagance  are  pursued.  It 
signifies  not  who  is  minister.  The  defect  lies  in  the  system. 
The  foundation  and  the  superstructure  of  the  government  is 
bad.  Prop  it  as  you  please,  it  continually  sinks  into  court 
government,  and  ever  will. 

I  return,  as  I  promised,  to  the  subject  of  the  national 
debt,  that  offspring  of  the  Dutch  Anglo  revolution,  and  its 
handmaid,  the  Hanover  succession. 

But  it  is  now  too  late  to  inquire  how  it  began.  Those  to 
whom  it  is  due  have  advanced  the  money ;  and  whether  it 
was  well  or  ill  sent,  or  pocketed,  is  not  their  crime. — It  is, 
however,  easy  to  see,  that  as  the  nation  proceeds  in  contem- 
plating the  nature  and  principles  of  government,  and  to 
understand  taxes,  and  make  comparisons  betweeen  those  of 
America,  France,  and  England,  it  will  be  next  to  impossible 
to  keep  it  in  the  same  torpid  state  it  has  hitherto  been.  Some 
reform  must,  from  the  necessity  of  the  case,  soon  begin.  It 
is  not  whether  these  principles  press  with  little  or  much 
force  in  the  present  moment.  They  are  out.  They  are 
abroad  in  the  world,  and  no  force  can  stop  them.  Like  a 
secret  told,  they  are  beyond  recall :  and  he  must  be  blind 
indeed  that  does  not  see  that  a  change  is  already  beginning. 

Nine  millions  of  dead  taxes  is  a  serious  thine ;  and  this 
not  only  for  bad,  but  in  a  great  measure  for  foreign  govern- 
ment. By  putting  the  power  of  making  war  into  the  hands 
of  the  foreigners  who  came  for  what  tney  could  get,  little 
else  was  to  oe  expected  than  what  has  happened. 

Reasons  are  already  advanced  in  this  work,  showing  that 
whatever  the  reforms  in  the  taxes  may  be,  they  ought  to  be 
made  in  the  current  expenses  of  government,  and  not  in  the 
part  applied  to  the  interest  of  the  national  debt. — By  remit- 
ting the  taxes  of  the  poor,  they  will  be  totally  relieved  and 
all  discontent  will  be  taken  away ;  and  by  striking  off  such 
of  the  taxes  as  are  already  mentioned,  the  nation  will  more 
than  recover  the  whole  expense  of  the  mad  American  war. 

There  will  then  remain  only  the  national  debt  as  a  subject 
of  discontent,  and  in  order  to  remove,  or  rather  to  prevent 
this,  it  would  be  good  policy  in  the  stockholders  themselves 
to  consider  it  as  property,  subject,  like  all  other  property,  to 


200  RIGHTS   OF   MAJST. 

bear  some  portion  of  the  taxes.  It  would  give  to  it  both 
popularity  and  security,  and,  as  a  great  part  of  its  present 
inconvenience  is  balanced  by  the  capital  which  it  keeps  alive, 
a  measure  of  this  kind  would  so  far  add  to  that  balance  as 
to  silence  objections. 

This  may  be  done  by  such  gradual  means  as  to  accom- 
plish all  that  is  necessary  with  the  greatest  ease  and  conve- 
nience. 

Instead  of  taxing  the  capital,  the  best  method  would  be 
to  tax  the  interest  by  some  progressive  ratio,  and  to  lessen 
the  public  taxes  in  the  same  proportion  as  the  interest 
diminished. 

.  Suppose  the  interest  was  taxed  one  halfpenny  in  the  pound 
the  first  year,  a  penny  more  the  second,  and  to  proceed  by 
a  certain  ratio  to  be  determined  upon,  always  less  than  any 
other  tax  upon  property.  Such  a  tax  would  be  subtracted 
from  the  interest  at  the  time  of  payment,  without  any  ex- 
pense of  collection. 

One  halfpenny  in  the  pound  would  lessen  the  interest  and 
consequently  the  taxes,  twenty  thousand  pounds.  The  tax 
on  wagons  amounts  to  this  sum,  and  this  tax  might  be  taken 
off  the  first  year.  The  second  year  the  tax  on  female  ser- 
vants, or  some  other  of  the  like  amount  might  also  be  taken 
off,  and  by  proceeding  in  this  manner,  always  applying  the 
tax  raised  from  the  property  of  the  debt  towards  its  extinc- 
tion, and  not  carrying  it  to  the  current  services,  it  would 
liberate  itself. 

The  stockholders,  notwithstanding  this  tax,  would  pay 
less  taxes  than  they  do  now.  What  they  would  save  by  the 
extinction  of  the  poor-rates,  and  the  tax  on  houses  and 
windows,  and  the  commutation  tax,  would  be  considerably 
greater  than  what  this  tax,  slow,  but  certain  in  its  opera- 
tion, amounts  to. 

It  appears  to  me  to  be  prudence  to  look  out  for  measures 
that  may  apply  under  any  circumstance  that  may  approach. 
There  is,  at  this  moment,  a  crisis  in  the  affairs  of  Europe 
that  requires  it.  Preparation  now  is  wisdom.  If  taxation 
be  once  let  loose,  it  will  be  difficult  to  reinstate  it ;  neither 
would  the  relief  be  so  effectual,  as  if  it  proceeded  by  some 
certain  and  gradual  reduction. 

The  fraud,  hypocrisy,  and  imposition  of  governments,  are 
now  beginning  to  be  too  well  understood  to  promise  them 
any  longer  career.  The  farce  of  monarchy  and  aristocracy ; 
in  all  countries,  ia  following  that  of  cnivalry,  and  Mr. 


RIGHTS   OF   MAS. 

Burke  is  dressing  for  the  funeral.  Let  it  then  pass  quietly 
to  the  tomb  of  all  other  follies,  and  the  mourners  be  com- 
forted. 

The  time  is  not  very  distant,  when  England  will  laugh  a* 
itself  for  sending  to  Holland,  Hanover,  Zell,  or  Brunswick 
for  men,  at  the  expense  of  a  million  a-year,  who  understood 
neither  her  laws,  her  language,  nor  her  interest,  and  whose 
capacities  would  scarcely  have  fitted  them  for  the  office  of 
a  parish  constable.  If  government  could  be  trusted  to  such 
hands,  it  must  be  some  easy  and  simple  thing  indeed,  and 
materials  fit  for  all  the  purposes  may  be  found  in  every  town 
and  village  in  England. 

When  it  shall  he  said  in  any  country  in  the  world,  my 
poor  are  happy :  neither  ignorance  nor  distress  is  to  be  found 
among  them ;  my  jails  are  empty  of  prisoners,  my  streets 
of  beggars;  the  aged  are  not  in  want,  the  taxes  are  not 
oppressive :  the  rational  world  is  my  friend,  because  I  am 
the  friend  of  its  happiness :  when  these  things  can  be  said, 
then  may  that  country  boast  of  its  constitution  and  its 
government. 

Within  the  space  of  a  few  years  we  have  seen  two  revo- 
lutions, those  of  America  and  France.  In  the  former,  the 
contest  was  long  and  the  conflict  severe ;  in  the  latter,  the 
nation  acted  with  such  a  consolidated  impulse,  that  having 
no  foreign  enemy  to  contend  with,  the  revolution  was  com- 
plete in  power  the  moment  it  appeared.  From  both  those 
instances  it  is  evident,  that  the  greatest  forces  that  can  be 
brought  into  the  field  of  revolutions,  are  reason  and  common 
interest.  Where  these  can  have  the  opportunity  of  acting, 
opposition  dies  with  fear,  or  crumbles  away  by  conviction. 
It  is  a  great  standing  which  they  have  now  universally 
obtained ;  and  we  may  hereafter  hope  to  see  revolutions,  or 
changes  in  governments,  produced  with  the  same  quiet  opera- 
tion by  which  any  measure,  determinable  by  reason  and  dis- 
cussion, is  accomplished. 

When  a  nation  changes  its  opinion  and  habits  of  think- 
ing, it  is  no  longer  to  be  governed  as  before ;  but  it  would 
not  only  be  wrong,  but  bad  policy,  to  attempt  by  force  what 
ought  to  be  accomplished  by  reason.  Rebellion  consists  in 
forcibly  opposing  the  general  will  of  a  nation,  whether  by  a 
party  or  by  a  government.  There  ought,  therefore,  to  be  in 
every  nation  a  method  of  occasionally  ascertaining  the  state 
of  public  opinion  with  respect  to  government.  On  this 
point  the  old  government  of  France  was  superior  to  the 


202  BIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

present  government  of  England,  because,  on  extraordinary 
occasions,  recourse  could  be  had  to  what  was  then  called  the 
states-general.  But  in  England  there  are  no  such  occasional 
bodies ;  and  as  to  those  who  are  now  called  representatives, 
a  gieat  part  of  them  are  mere  machines  of  the  court,  place- 
men and  dependants. 

I  presume,  that  though  all  the  people  of  England  pay 
taxes,  not  an  hundredth  part  of  them  are  electors,  and  the 
members  of  one  of  the  houses  of  parliament  represent 
nobody  but  themselves.  There  is,  therefore,  no  power  but 
the  voluntary  will  of  the  people  that  has  a  right  to  act  in 
any  matter  respecting  a  general  reform ;  and  by  the  same 
right  that  two  persons  can  confer  on  such  a  subject,  a  thou- 
sand may.  The  object,  in  all  such  preliminary  proceedings, 
is  to  find  out  what  the  general  sense  of  a  nation  is,  and  to 
be  governed  by  it.  If  it  prefer  a  bad  or  defective  govern- 
ment to  a  reform,  or  choose  to  pay  ten  times  more  taxes 
than  there  is  any  occasion  for,  it  has  a  right  so  to  do ;  and 
so  long  as  the  majority  do  not  impose  conditions  on  the 
minority,  different  from  what  they  impose  upon  themselves, 
though  there  may  be  much  error,  there  is  no  injustice. 
Neither  will  the  error  continue  long.  Reason  and  discussion 
will  soon  bring  things  right,  however  wrong  they  may  begin. 
By  such  a  process  no  tumult  is  to  be  apprehended.  The 
poor,  in  all  countries,  are  naturally  both  peaceable  and 
grateful  in  all  reforms  in  which  their  interest  and  happiness 
are  included.  It  is  only  by  neglecting  and  rejecting  them 
that  they  become  tumultuous. 

The  objects  that  now  press  on  the  public  attention  are,  the 
French  revolution,  and  the  prospect  of  a  general  revolution 
in  governments.  Of  all  nations  in  Europe  there  is  none  so 
much  interested  in  the  French  revolution  as  England. 
Enemies  for  ages,  and  that  at  a  vast  expense,  and  without 
any  national  object,  the  opportunity  now  presents  itself  of 
amicably  closing  the  scene,  and  joining  their  efforts  to  reform 
the  rest  of  Europe.  By  doing  this  they  will  not  only  pre- 
vent the  further  effusion  of  blood,  and  increase  of  taxes,  but 
be  in  a  condition  of  getting  rid  of  a  considerable  part  of 
their  present  burdens,  as  has  been  already  stated.  Long 
experience,  however,  has  shown,  that  reforms  of  this  kind 
are  not  those  which  old  governments  wish  to  promote,  and 
therefore,  it  is  to  nations,  and  not  to  such  governments,  that 
these  matters  present  themselves. 

In  the  preceding  part  of  this  work,  I  have  spoken  of  au 


KIOHT8   OF   MAN.  203 

alliance  between  England,  France,  and  America  for  pur- 
poses that  were  to  be  afterwards  mentioned.  Though  I  have 
no  direct  authority  on  the  part  of  America,  I  have  good 
reason  to  conclude  that  she  is  disposed  to  enter  into  a  con- 
sideration of -such  a  measure,  provided  that  the  governments 
with  which  she  might  ally,  acted  as  national  governments, 
and  not  as  courts  enveloped  in  intrigue  and  mystery.  That 
France  as  a  nation  and  a  national  government,  would  prefer 
an  alliance  with  England,  is  a  matter  of  certainty.  Na- 
tions, like  individuals  who  have  long  been  enemies,  without 
knowing  each  other,  or  knowing  why,  become  better  friends 
when  they  discover  the  errors  and  impositions  under  which 
they  had  acted. 

Admitting,  therefore,  the  probability  of  such  a  connexion, 
I  will  state  some  matters  by  which  such  an  alliance,  to- 
gether vrith  that  of  Holland,  might  render  service,  not  only 
to  the  parties  immediately  concerned,  but  to  all  parts  of 
Europe. 

It  is,  I  think,  quite  certain,  that  if  the  fleets  of  England, 
France,  and  Holland  were  confederated,  they  could  pro- 
pose, with  effect,  a  limitation  to,  and  a  general  dismantling 
of,  all  the  navies  in  Europe,  to  a  certain  proportion  to  be 
agreed  upon. 

1st,  That  no  new  ship  of  war  shall  be  built  by  any  power 
in  EuroDe,  themselves  included. 

2d,  "That  all  the  navies  now  in  existence  shall  be  put 
back,  supposed  to  one  tenth  of  their  present  force.  This 
will  save  to  France  and  England,  each,  at  least  two  millions 
annually,  and  their  relative  force  be  in  the  same  proportion 
as  it  is  now.  If  men  will  permit  themselves  to  think,  as 
rational  beings  ought  to  think,  nothing  can  appear  more 
ridiculous  and  absurd,  exclusive  of  all  moral  reflections,  than 
to  be  at  the  expense  of  building  navies,  filling  them  with 
men,  and  then  hauling  them  into  the  ocean,  to  try  which 
can  sink  each  other  fastest.  Peace,  which  costs  nothing, 
is  attended  with  infinitely  more  advantage,  than  any  victory 
with  all  its  expense.  But  this,  though  it  best  answers  tho 
purpose  of  nations,  does  not  that  of  court  government*, 
whose  habitual  policy  is  pretence  for  taxation,  places  and 
offices. 

It  is,  1  think,  also  certain  that  the  above  confederated 
powers,  together  with  that  of  the  United  States  of  America, 
c&n  propose,  with  effect,  to  Spain,  the  independence  of  South 
America,  and  the  opening  those  countries  of  immense  extent 


204  BIGHTS   OF  MAW. 

and  wealth  to  the  general  commerce  of  the  world,  as  North 
America  now  is. 

With  how  much  more  glory,  and  advantage  to  itself,  does 
a  nation  act,  when  it  exerts  its  powers  to  rescue  the  world 
from  bondage,  and  to  create  to  itself  friends,  than  when  it 
employs  those  powers  to  increase  ruin,  desolation,  and  misery. 
The  horrid  scene  that  is  now  acting  by  the  English  govern- 
ment in  the  East  Indies,  is  fit  only  to  be  told  of  Goths  and 
Yandals,  who,  destitute  of  principle,  robbed  and  tortured 
the  world  which  they  were  incapable  of  enjoying. 

The  opening  of  South  America  would  produce  an  immense 
lield  for  commerce,  and  a  ready  money  market  for  manufac- 
tures, which  the  eastern  world  does  not.  The  East  is  already 
a  country  of  manufactures,  the  importation  of  which  is  not 
only  an  injury  to  the  manufactures  of  England,  but  a  drain 
upon  its  specie.  The  balance  against  England  by  this  trade 
fe  regularly  upwards  of  half  a  million  annually  sent  out  in 
the  East  India  ships  in  silver ;  and  this  is  the  reason,  to- 
gether with  German  intrigue,  and  German  subsidies,  that 
there  is  so  little  silver  in  England. 

But  any  war  is  harvest  to  such  governments,  however  ruin- 
ous it  may  be  to  a  nation.  It  serves  to  keep  up  deceitful  ex- 
pectations, which  prevent  people  from  looking  into  the  defects 
and  abuses  of  government.  It  is  the  lo  here !  and  the  lo 
there  !  that  amuses  and  cheats  the  multitude. 

Never  did  so  great  an  opportunity  offer  itself  to  England, 
and  to  all  Europe,  as  is  produced  by  the  two  revolutions  of 
America  and  France.  By  the  former,  freedom  has  a  national 
champion  in  the  western  world  ;  and  by  the  latter,  in  Europe. 
When  another  nation  shall  join  France,  despotism  and  bad 
government  will  scarcely  dare  to  appear.  To  use  a  trite  ex- 
pression, the  iron  is  becoming  hot  all  over  Europe.  The  in- 
sulted German  and  the  enslaved  Spaniard,  the  Russ  and  the 
Pole  .are  beginning  to  think.  The  present  age  will  hereafter 
merit  to  be  called  the  Age  of  Reason,  and  the  present  gene- 
ration will  appear  to  the  future  as  the  Adam  of  a  new 
world. 

When  all  the  governments  of  Europe  shall  be  established 
on  the  representative  system,  nations  will  become  acquainted, 
and  the  animosities  and  prejudices  fomented  by  the  intrigues 
and  artifice  of  courts,  will  cease.  The  oppressed  soldier  will 
become  a  freeman ;  and  the  tortured  sailor,  no  longer  dragged 
through  the  streets  like  a  felon,  will  pursue  his  mercantile 
voyage  in  safety.  It  would  be  better  that  nations  should 


BIGHTS   OF    MJLN.  205 

continue  the  pay  of  their  soldiers  during  their  lives,  and  give 
them  their  discharge  and  restore  them  to  freedom  and  their 
friends,  and  cease  recruiting,  than  retain  such  multitudes  at 
the  same  expense,  in  a  condition  useless  to  society  and  to 
themselves.  As  soldiers  have  hitherto  been  treated  in  most 
countries,  they  might  be  said  to  be  without  a  friend.  Shunned 
by  the  citizens  on  an  apprehension  of  their  being  enemies  to 
liberty,  and  too  often  insulted  by  those  who  commanded 
them,  their  condition  was  a  double  oppression.  But  where 
genuine  principles  of  liberty  pervade  a  people,  every  thing  is 
restored  to  order  ;  and  the  soldier  civilly  treated,  returns  the 
civility. 

In  contemplating  revolutions,  it  is  easy  to  perceive  that 
they  may  arise  from  two  distinct  causes ;  the  one,  to  avoid 
or  get  rid  of  some  great  calamity,  the  other,  to  obtain  some 
great  and  positive  good ;  and  the  two  may  be  distinguished 
by  the  names  of  active  and  passive  revolutions.  In  those 
which  proceed  from  the  former  cause,  the  temper  becomes 
incensed  and  soured ;  and  the  redress,  obtained  by  danger,  is 
too  often  sullied  by  revenge.  But  in  those  which  proceed 
from  the  latter,  the  heart,  rather  animated  than  agitated, 
enters  serenely  upon  the  subject.  Keason  and  discussion, 
persuasion  and  conviction,  become  the  weapons  in  the  con- 
test, and  it  is  only  when  those  are  attempted  to  be  suppressed 
that  recourse  is  had  to  violence.  When  men  unite  in  agree- 
ing that  a  thing  is  good,  could  it  be  obtained,  such  for 
instance  as  relief  from  a  burden  of  taxes  and  the  extinction 
of  corruption,  the  object  is  more  than  half  accomplished. 
What  they  approve  as  the  end,they  will  promote  in  the  means. 

Will  any  man  say  in  the  present  excess  of  taxation,  falling 
so  heavily  on  the  poor,  that  a  remission  of  five  pounds 
annually  of  taxes  to  one  hundred  and  four  thousand  poor 
families  is  not  a  good  thing  f  Will  he  say  that  a  remission 
of  seven  pounds  annually  to  one  hundred  thousand  other 
poor  families  ;  of  eight  pounds  annually  to  another  hundred 
housand  poor  families,  and  of  ten  pounds  annually  to  fifty 
thousand  poor  and  widowed  families  are  not  good,  things  f 
And  to  proceed  a  step  further  in  this  climax,  will  he  say, 
that  to  provide  against  the  misfortunes  to  which  all  human 
life  is  subject,  by  securing  six  pounds  annually  for  all  poor, 
distressed,  and  reduced  persons  of  the  age  of  fifty  and  until 
sixty,  and  of  ten  pounds  annually  after  sixty,  is  not  a  good 
thing  t 

Will  he  say,  that  an  abolition  of  two  millions  of  poor 


206  RIGHTS   OF  MAN. 

rates  to  the  housekeepers,  and  of  the  whole  of  the  house  and 
window-light  tax  and  of  the  commutation  tax  is  not  a  good 
thing  ?  Or  will  he  say,  that  to  abolish  corruption  is  a  bad 
iking  f 

If,  therefore,  the  good  to  be  obtained  be  worthy  of  a  pas- 
sive, rational,  and  costless  revolution,  it  would  be  bad  poliey 
to  prefer  waiting  for  a  calamity  that  should  force  a  violent 
one.  I  have  no  idea,  considering  the  reforms  which  are  now 
passing  and  spreading  throughout  Europe,  that  England 
will  permit  herself  to  be  the  last ;  and  where  the  occasion 
and  the  opportunity  quietly  offer,  it  is  better  than  to  wait 
for  a  turbulent  necessity.  It  may  be  considered  as  an  honor 
to  the  animal  faculties  of  man  to  obtain  redress  by  courage 
and  danger,  but  it  is  far  greater  honor  to  the  rational 
faculties  to  accomplish  the  same  object  by  reason,  accom- 
modation, and  general  consent.* 

As  reforms,  or  revolutions,  call  them  which  you  please 
extend  themselves  among  nations,  those  nations  will  form 
connexions  and  conventions,  and  when  a  few  are  thus  con- 
federated, the  progress  will  be  rapid,  till  despotism  and  cor- 
rupt government  be  totally  expelled,  at  least  out  of  two 
quarters  of  the  world,  Europe  and  America,  The  Algerine 
piracy  may  then  be  commanded  to  cease,  for  it  is  only  by 
the  malicious  policy  of  old  governments  against  each  other 
that  it  exists. 

Throughout  this  work,  various  and  numerous  as  the  sub- 
jects are,  which  I  have  taken  up  and  investigated,  there  is 
onlv  a  single  paragraph  upon  religion,  viz.  "  that  every 
religion  is  good  that  teaches  man  to  be  good" 

I  have  carefully  avoided  to  enlarge  upon  the  subject, 

*  I  know  it  is  the  opinion  of  many  of  the  most  enlightened  characters  in 
France  (there  always  will  be  those  who  see  further  into  events  than  others), 
not  only  among  the  general  mass  of  citizens,  but  of  many  of  the  principal 
members  of  the  national  assembly,  that  the  monarchical  plan  will  not  continue 
many  years  in  that  country.  They  have  found  out,  that  as  wisdom  cannot  be 
hereditary,  power  ought  not — and  that  for  a  man  to  merit  a  million  sterling 
a-year  from  a  nation,  he  ought  to  have  a  mind  capable  of  comprehending  from 
an  atom  to  a  universe,  which,  if  he  had,  he  would  be  above  receiving  the  pay . 
But  they  wished  not  to  appear  to  lead  the  nation  faster  than  its  own  reason  and 
interest  dictated.  In  all  the  conversations  where  I  have  been  present  upon 
this  subject,  the  idea  always  was,  that  when  such  a  time,  from  the  general 
opinion  of  the  nation,  shall  arrive,  that  the  honorable  and  liberal  method  would 
be,  to  make  a  handsome  present  in  fee  simple  to  the  person,  whoever  he  may 
oe,  that  shall  then  be  in  the  monarchical  office,  and  for  him  to  retire  to  the 
enjoyment  of  private  life,  possessing  his  share  of  general  rights  and  privileges, 
and  to  be  no  more  accountable  to  the  public  for  his  time  and  his  conduct  than 
any  other  citizen. 


BIGHTS  OF  MAM.  207 

oecause  I  am  inclined  to  believe,  that  what  is  called  the  pre- 
sent ministry,  wish  to  see  contentions  about  religion  kept  up 
to  prevent  the  nation  turning  its  attention  to  subjects  of 
government.  It  is  as  if  they  were  to  say,  "  look  that  way,  or 
any  way  but  this." 

J3ut  as  religion  is  very  improperly  made  a  political 
machine,  and  the  reality  of  it  is  thereby  destroyed,  I  will 
conclude  this  work  with  stating  in  what  light  religion  appears 
to  me. 

If  we  suppose  a  large  family  of  children,  who,  on  any 
particular  day,  or  particular  occasion,  made  it  a  custom  to 
present  to  their  parents  some  token  of  their  affection  and 
gratitude,  each  ot  them  would  make  a  different  offering,  and 
most  probably  in  a  different  manner.  Some  would  pay  their 
congratulations  in  themes  of  verse  and  prose,  by  some  little 
devices,  as  their  genius  dictated,  or  according  to  what  they 
thought  would  please ;  and,  perhaps,  the  least  of  all,  not 
able  to  do  any  of  those  things,  would  ramble  into  the  gar- 
den, or  the  field,  and  gather  what  it  thought  the  prettiest 
flower  it  could  find,  though,  perhaps,  it  might  be  but  a  sim- 
ple weed.  The  parents  would  be  more  gratified  by  such  a 
variety,  than  if  the  whole  of  them  had  acted  on  a  concerted 
plan,  and  each  had  made  exactly  the  same  offering.  This 
would  have  the  cold  appearance  of  contrivance,  or  the  harsh 
one  of  control.  But  ot  all  unwelcome  things,  nothing  would 
more  afflict  the  parent  than  to  know,  that  the  whole  of 
them  had  afterwards  gotten  together  bv  the  ears,  boys  and 
girls,  fighting,  reviling,  and  abusing  eacn  other  about  which 
was  the  best  or  the  worst  present. 

Why  may  we  not  suppose,  that  the  great  Father  of  all  is 
pleased  with  variety  of  devotion ;  and  that  the  greatest 
offence  we  can  act,  is  that  by  which  we  seek  to  torment  and 
render  each  other  miserable  ?  For  my  own  part,  I  am  fully 
satisfied  that  what  I  am  now  doing,  with  an  endeavor  to 
conciliate  mankind,  to  render  their  condition  happy,  to  unite 
nations  that  have  hitherto  been  enemies,  and  to  extirpate 
the  horrid  practice  of  war,  and  break  the  chains  of  slavery 
and  oppression,  is  acceptable  in  his  sight,  and  being  the  best 
service  I  can  perform,  I  act  it  cheerfully. 

I  do  not  believe  that  any  two  men,  on  what  are  called 
doctrinal  points,  think  alike  who  think  at  all.  It  is  only 
those  who  have  not  thought  that  appear  to  agree.  It  is  in 
this  case  as  with  what  is  called  the  British  constitution.  li 
has  been  taken  for  granted  to  be  good,  and  encomiums  have 


808  EIGHTS  OF  MAN. 

supplied  the  place  of  proof.  But  when  the  nation  comes 
to  examine  into  principles  and  the  abuses  it  admits,  it  wiD 
be  found  to  have  more  defects  than  I  have  pointed  out  in 
this  work  and  the  former. 

As  to  what  are  called  national  religions,  we  may,  with  as 
much  propriety,  talk  of  national  gods.  It  is  either  political 
craft  or  the  remains  of  the  pagan  system,  when  every  nation 
had  its  separate  particular  deity.  Among  all  the  writers  of 
the  English  church  clergy,  who  have  treated  on  the  general 
subject  of  religion,  the  present  bishop  of  Landaff  has  not 
been  excelled,  and  it  is  with  much  pleasure  that  I  take  this 
opportunity  of  expressing  this  token  of  respect.  I  have 
aow  gone  through  the  whole  of  the  subject,  at  least,  as  far 
as  it  appears  to  me  at  present.  It  has  been  my  intention 
for  the  nve  years  I  have  been  in  Europe  to  offer  an  address 
to  the  people  of  England  on  the  subject  of  government,  if 
the  opportunity  presented  itself  before  I  returned  to  Ame- 
rica. Mr.  Burke  has  thrown  it  in  my  way,  and  I  thank  him. 
On  a  certain  occasion,  three  years  ago,  I  pressed  him  to 
propose  a  national  convention,  to  be  fairly  elected,  for  the 
purpose  of  taking  the  state  of  the  nation  into  consideration ; 
but  1  found  that  nowever  strongly  the  parliamentary  current 
was  then  setting  against  the  party  he  acted  with,  their  policy 
was  to  keep  every  thing  within  that  field  of  corruption,  and 
trust  to  accidents.  Long  experience  had  shown  that  parlia- 
ments would  follow  any  change  of  ministers,  and  on  this 
they  rested  their  hopes  and  their  expectations. 

Formerly,  when  divisions  arose  respecting  governments,, 
recourse  was  had  to  the  sword,  and  a  civil  war  ensued. 
That  savage  custom  is  exploded  by  the  new  system,  and 
reference  is  had  to  national  conventions.  Discussion  and 
the  general  will  arbitrates  the  question,  and  to  this,  private 
opinion  yields  with  a  good  grace,  and  order  is  preserved 
uninterrupted. 

Some  gentlemen  have  affected  to  call  the  principles 
upon  which  this  work  and  the  former  part  of  the  Rights  of 
Man  are  founded,  "  a  new-fangled  doctrine."  The  question 
is  not  whether  these  principles  are  new  or  old,  but  whether 
they  are  right  or  wrong.  Suppose  the  former,  I  will  show 
their  effect  by  a  figure  easily  understood. 

It  is  now  towards  the  middle  of  February.  "Were  I  to 
take  a  turn  into  the  country,  the  trees  would  present  a  leaf- 
less, wintery  appearance.  As  people  are  apt  to  pluck  twigs 
is  they  go  along,  I  perhaps  might  do  the  same,  and  by  chance 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN.  209 

might  observe,  that  a  single  bud  on  that  twig  had  begun  to 
swell.  I  should  reason  very  unnaturally,  or  rather  not 
reason  at  all,  to  suppose  this  was  the  only  bud  in  England 
which  had  this  appearance.  Instead  of  deciding  thus,  I 
should  instantly  conclude,  that  the  same  appearance  was 
beginning,  or  about  to  begin,  every  where ;  and  though  the 
vegetable  sleep  will  continue  longer  on  some  trees  and  plants 
than  on  others,  and  though  some  of  them  may  not  blossom 
for  two  or  three  years,  all  will  be  in  leaf  in  the  summer,  ex- 
cept those  which  are  rotten.  What  pace  the  political  summer 
may  keep  with  the  natural,  no  human  foresight  can  deter- 
mine. It  is,  however,  not  difficult  to  perceive  that  the 
spring  is  begun.  Thus  wishing,  as  I  sincerely  do,  freedom 
and  happiness  to  all  nations,  I  close  the  SECOND  PAST. 


APPENDIX 


A«  the  publication  of  this  work  has  been  delayed  beyond 
the  time  intended,  L  think  it  not  improper,  all  circumstances 
considered,  to  state  the  causes  that  have  occasioned  that 
delay. 

The  reader  will  probably  observe,  that  some  parts  in  the 
plan  contained  in  this  work  for  reducing  the  taxes,  and 
certain  parts  in  Mr.  Pitt's  speech  at  the  opening  of  the 
present  session,  Tuesday,  January  31,  are  so  much  alike,  as 
to  induce  a  belief,  that  either  the  author  had  taken  the  hint 
from  Mr.  Pitt,  or  Mr.  Pitt  from  the  author. — I  will  first 
point  out  the  parts  that  are  similar,  and  then  state  such  cir- 
cumstances as  I  am  acquainted  with,  leaving  the  reader  to 
make  his  own  conclusion. 

Considering  it  as  almost  an  unprecedented  case,  that  taxes 
should  be  proposed  to  be  taken  off,  it  is  equally  extraordi- 
nary that  such  a  measure  should  occur  to  two  persons  at  the 
same  time ;  and  still  more  so  (considering  the  vast  variety 
and  multiplicity  of  taxes,)  that  they  should  hit  on  the  same 
specific  taxes.  Mr.  Pitt  has  mentioned,  in  his  speech,  the 
tax  on  carts  and  wagons;  that  on  female  servants ;  the 


210  BIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

lowerino;  the  tax  on  candles  and  the  taking  off  the  tax  oJ 
three  shillings  on  houses  having  under  seven  windows. 

Every  one  of  those  specific  taxes  are  a  part  of  the  plan 
contained  in  this  work,  and  proposed  also  to  be  taken  off. 
Mr.  Pitt's  plan,  it  is  true,  goes  no  further  than  to  a  reduction 
of  three  hundred  and  twenty  thousand  pounds ;  and  the 
reduction  proposed  in  this  work,  to  nearly  six  millions.  I 
have  made  my  calculations  on  only  sixteen  millions  and  a 
half  of  revenue,  still  asserting  that  it  was  very  nearly,  if  not 
quite,  seventeen  millions.  Mr.  Pitt  states  it  at  16,690,000?. 
1  know  enough  of  the  matter  to  say,  that  he  has  not  over- 
stated it.  Having  thus  given  the  particulars,  which  corres- 
pond in  this  work  and  his  speech,  1  will  state  a  chain  of  cir- 
cumstances that  may  lead  to  some  explanation. 

The  first  hint  for  lessening  the  taxes,  and  that  as  a  con- 
sequence flowing  from  the  French  revolution,  is  to  be  found 
in  the  Address  and  Declaration  of  the  gentlemen  who  met 
at  the  Thatched-House  tavern,  August  20,  1Y91.  Among 
many  other  particulars  stated  in  that  address,  is  the  follow- 
ing, put  as  an  interrogation  to  the  government  opposera 
of  the  French  revolution.  "  Are  they  sorry  that  the  pretence 
for  new  oppressive  taxes,  and  the  occasion  for  continuing 
many  old  taxes  will  be  at  an  end  f" 

It  is  well  known,  that  the  persons  who  chiefly  frequent 
the  Thatched-House  tavern,  are  men  of  court  connexions, 
and  so  much  did  they  take  this  address  and  declaration 
respecting  the  French  revolution,  and  the  reduction  of  taxes, 
in  disgust,  that  the  landlord  was  under  the  necessity  of  in- 
forming the  gentlemen,  who  composed  the  meeting  of  the 
20th  of  August,  and  who  proposed  holding  another  meeting, 
that  he  could  not  receive  them.* 

*  The  gentleman  who  signed  the  address  and  declaration  as  chairman  of 
the  meeting,  Mr.  Home  Tooke,  being  generally  supposed  to  be  the  person 
who  drew  it  up,  and  having  spoken  much  in  commendation  of  it,  has  been 
jocularly  accused  of  praising  his  own  work.  To  free  him  from  this  embar- 
rassment, and  to  save  him  the  repeated  trouble  of  mentioning  the  author,  a» 
he  has  not  failed  to  do,  I  make  no  hesitation  in  saying,  that  as  the  opportunity 
of  benefiting  by  the  French  revolution  easily  occurred  to  me,  I  drew  up  the 
publication  in  question,  and  showed  it  to  him  and  some  other  gentlemen  ;  who, 
fully  approving  it,  held  a  meeting  for  the  purpose  of  making  it  public,  and 
subscribed  to  the  amount  of  fifty  guineas  to  defray  the  expense  of  advertising. 
I  believe  there  are  at  this  time  in  England  a  greater  number  of  men  acting  on 
disinterested  principles,  and  determined  to  look  into  the  nature  and  practices 
of  government  themselves,  and  not  blindly  trust,  as  has  hitherto  been  the  case% 
either  to  government  generally,  or  to  parliaments,  or  to  parliamentary  oppo- 
sition, than  at  any  former  period.  Had  this  been  done  a  century  ago,  cor* 
"uption  and  taxation  had  not  arrived  to  the  height  *bey  are  now  at. 


BIGHTS   OF   MAN.  211 

What  was  only  hinted  in  the  address  and  declaration 
respecting  taxes  and  principles  of  government,  will  be  found 
reduced  to  a  regular  system  in  this  work.  But  as  Mr.  Pitt's 
speech  contains  some  of  the  same  things  respecting  taxes,  I  now 
come  to  give  the  circumstances  before  alluded  to. 

The  case  is  this:  this  work  was  intended  to  be  published 
just  before  the  meeting  of  parliament,  and  for  that  purpose 
a  considerable  part  of  the  copy  was  put  into  the  printer's 
hands  in  September,  and  all  the  remaining  copy,  as  far  as 
page  114,  which  contains  the  part  to  which  Mr.  Pitt's 
speech  is  similar,  was  given  to  him  full  six  weeks  before  the 
meeting  of  parliament,  and  he  was  informed  of  the  time  at 
which  it  was  to  appear.  He  had  composed  nearly  the 
whole  about  a  fortnight  before  the  time  of  parliament's 
meeting,  and  had  printed  as  far  as  page  70,  and  had  given 
me  a  proof  of  the  next  sheet,  up  to  page  86.  It  was  then 
in  sufficient  forwardness  to  be  out  at  the  time  proposed,  as 
two  other  sheets  were  ready  for  striking  off.  I  had  before 
told  him,  that  if  he  thought  he  should  be  straitened  for  time, 
I  could  get  part  of  the  work  done  at  another  press,  which  he 
desired  me  not  to  do.  In  this  manner  the  work  stood  on 
the  Tuesday  fortnight  preceding  the  meeting  of  parliament, 
when  all  at  once,  without  any  previous  intimation,  though  I 
had  been  with  Mm  the  evening  before,  he  sent  me  by  one  of 
his  workmen,  all  the  remaining  copy,  from  page  70,  declin- 
ing to  go  on  with  the  work  on  (my  consideration. 

To  account  for  this  extraordinary  conduct  I  was  totally  at 
a  loss,  as  he  stopped  at  the  part  where  the  arguments  on 
systems  and  principles  of  government  closed,  and  where  the 
plan  for  the  redaction  of  taxes,  the  education  of  children, 
and  the  support  of  the  poor  and  the  aged  begins ;  and  still 
more  especially,  as  he  had,  at  the  time  of  his  beginning  to 
print,  and  before  he  had  seen  the  whole  copy,  offered  a 
thousand  pounds  for  the  copy-right,  together  with  the  future 
copy-right  of  the  former  part  of  the  Rights  of  Man.  I  told 
the  person  who  brought  me  this  offer  that  I  should  not  ac- 
cept it,  and  wished  it  not  to  be  renewed,  giving  him  as  my 
reason,  that  though  I  believed  the  printer  to  be  an  honest 
man,  I  would  never  put  it  in  the  power  of  any  printer  or 
publisher  to  suppress  or  alter  a  work  of  mine,  bv  making 
mm  master  of  the  copy,  or  give  to  him  the  right  of  selling  it 
to  any  minister,  or  to  anv  other  person,  or  to  treat  as  a  mere 
matter  of  traffic,  that  which  I  intended  should  operate  as  a 
principle. 


212  EIGHTS   OF   MAN. 

His  refusal  to  complete  the  work  (which  he  could  not  pur- 
chase) obliged  me  to  seek  for  another  printer,  and  this  of 
consequence  would  throw  the  publication  back  till  after  .the 
meeting  of  parliament,  otherwise  it  would  have  appeared 
that  Mr.  Pitt  had  only  taken  up  a  part  of  the  plan  which  I 
had  more  fully  stated. 

Whether  that  gentleman,  or  any  other,  had  seen  the  work 
or  any  part  of  it,  is  more  than  I  have  authority  to  say.  But 
the  manner  in  which  the  work  was  returned,  and  the  par- 
ticular time  at  which  this  was  done,  and  that  after  the 
offers  he  had  made,  are  suspicious  circumstances.  I  know 
what  the  opinion  of  booksellers  and  publishers  is  upon  such 
a  case,  but  as  to  my  own  opinion,  I  choose  to  make  no 
declaration.  There  are  many  ways  by  which  proof  sheets 
may  be  procured  by  other  persons  before  a  work  publicly 
appears;  to  which  I  shall  add  a  certain  circumstance, 
wnich  is, 

A  ministerial  bookseller  in  Piccadilly,  who  has  been  em- 
ployed, as  common  report  says,  by  a  clerk  of  one  of  the 
boards  closely  connected  with  the  ministry  (the  board  of 
trade  and  plantations,  of  which  Hawkesbury  is  president)  to 
publish  what  he  calls  my  Life,  (I  wish  his  own  life  and  those 
of  the  cabinet  were  as  good,)  used  to  have  his  books  printed 
at  the  same  printing-office  that  I  employed  ;  but  wnen  the 
former  parts  of  the  Rights  of  Man  came  out,  he  took  hia 
work  away  in  dudgeon  ;  and  about  a  week  or  ten  days  be- 
fore the  printer  returned  my  copy,  he  came  to  make  him  an 
offer  of  his  work  again,  which  was  accepted.  This  would 
consequently  give  him  admission  into  the  printing-office 
where  the  sheets  of  this  work  were  then  lying ;  and  as  book- 
sellers and  printers  are  free  with  each  other,  ne  would  have 
the  opportunity  of  seeing  what  was  going  on.  Be  the  case, 
however,  as  it  may,  Mr.  Pitt's  plan,  little  and  diminutive  as 
it  is,  would  have  made  a  very  awkward  appearance,  had  thig 
work  appeared  at  the  time  me  printer  had  engaged  to  finish 
it. 

I  have  now  stated  the  particulars  which  occasioned  the 
delay,  from  the  proposal  to  purchase,  to  the  refusal  to  print. 
If  all  the  gentlemen  are  innocent,  it  is  very  unfortunate  for 
them  that  such  a  variety  of  suspicious  circumstances  should, 
without  any  design,  arrange  themselves  together. 

Having:  now  finished  this  part,  I  will  .conclude  with  stat- 
•  i  • 

ing  another  circumstanoe. 

About  a  fortnight  or  three  weeks  before  the  meeting  of 


BIGHTS   OF   MAH.  21  & 

parliament,  a  small  addition,  amounting  to  about  twelve 
shillings  and  sixpence  a-year,  was  made  to  the  pay  of  the  sol- 
diers, or  rather  their  pay  was  docked  so  much  less. — Some 
gentlemen  who  knew  in  part,  that  this  work  would  contain 
a  plan  of  reforms  respecting  the  oppressed  condition  of  sol- 
diers, wished  me  to  add  a  note  to  the  work,  signifying  that 
the  part  upon  that  subject  had  been  in  the  printer's  hands 
some  weeks  before  that  addition  of  pay  was  proposed.  I 
declined  doing  this,  lest  it  should  be  interpreted  into  an  air 
of  vanity,  or  an  endeavour  to  excite  suspicion  (for  which 
perhaps  there  might  be  no  grounds)  that  some  of  the  govern- 
ment gentlemen  nad,  by  some  means  or  other,  made  out 
what  this  work  would  contain ;  and  had  not  the  printing 
been  interrupted  so  as  to  occasion  a  delay  beyond  Tie  time 
fixed  for  publication,  nothing  contained  in  this  appendix 
would  have  appeared. 

THOMAS  PAIR. 


BID  Of  THE    MGHT8   OJ  MAX. 


AGE  OF  REASON. 


FELLOW    CITIZENS 


UNITED    STATES   OF    AMERICA 


I  PUT  the  following  work  under  your  protection.  It  con- 
tains my  opinion  upon  Religion.  You  will  do  me  the  jus- 
tice to  remember,  that  I  have  always  strenuously  supported 
the  Right  of  every  Man  to  his  opinion,  however  different 
that  opinion  might  be  to  mine.  He  who  denies  to  another 
this  right,  makes  a  slave  of  himself  to  his  present  opinion, 
because  he  precludes  himself  the  right  of  changing  it. 

The  most  formidable  weapon  against  errors  of  every 
kind  is  Reason.  1  have  never  used  any  other,  and  I  truat 
I  never  shall. 

Your  affectionate  friend  and  fellow  citizen, 

THOMAS  PAINE. 


Luxembourg,  (Paris,)  8th  Pukoite, 
titeond  year  of  the  French  Republic,  one  nnd  indivinbb, 
January  27,  0.  S.  1794. 


THE  AGE  OF  REASON. 


PART  FIRST. 

It  has  been  my  intention,  for  several  years  past,  to  publish 
my  tl  oughts  upon  religion  ;  I  am  well  aware  of  the  difficulties 
that  p.ttend  the  subject,  and  from  that  consideration,  had  re- 
served it  to  a  more  advanced  period  of  life.  I  intended  it 
to  be  the  last  offering  I  should  make  to  my  fellow-citizens 
of  all  nations,  and  that  at  a  time  when  the  purity  of  the 
motive  that  induced  me  to  it,  could  not  admit  of  a  question, 
even  by  those  who  might  disapprove  the  work. 

The  circumstance  that  has  now  taken  place  in  France  of 
the  total  abolition  of  the  whole  national  order  of  priesthood, 
and  of  every  thing  appertaining  to  compulsive  systems  of 
religion,  and  compulsive  articles  of  faith,  has  not  only  pre- 
cipitated my  intention,  but  rendered  a  work  of  this  kind 
exceedingly  necessary,  lest,  in  the  general  wreck  of  supersti- 
tion, of  false  systems  of  government,  and  false  theology,  we 
lose  sight  of  morality,  of  humanity,  and  of  the  theology  that 
is  true. 

As  several  of  my  colleagues,  and  others  of  my  fellow-citizens 
of  France,  have  given  me  the  example  of  making  their  voluntary 
and  individual  profession  of  faith,  I  also  will  make  mine  ;  and 
I  do  this  with  all  that  sincerity  and  frankness  with  which  the 
mind  of  man  communicates  with  itself. 

I  believe  in  one  God,  and  no  more  ;  and  I  hope  for  hap- 
piness beyond  this  life. 

I  believe  in  the  equality  of  man  ;  and  I  believe  that  religious 
duties  consist  in  doing  justice,  loving  mercy,  and  endeavoring 
to  make  our  fellow  creatures  happy. 

But,  lest  it  should  be  supposed  that  I  believe  many  other 
things  in  addition  to  these,  I  shall,  in  the  progress  of  this 
work,  declare  the  things  I  do  not  believe,  and  my  reasons  for 
not  believing  them. 

I  do  not  believe  in  the  creed  professed  by  the  Jewish 


6  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  [PART   I. 

church,  by  the  Roman  church,  by  the  Greek  church,  by  the 
Turkish  church,  by  the  Protestant  church,  nor  by  any  church 
that  I  know  of.  My  own  mind  is  my  own  church. 

All  national  institutions  of  churches,  whether  Jewish, 
Christian,  or  Turkish,  appear  to  me  no  other  than  human 
inventions,  set  up  to  terrify  and  enslave  mankind,  and  mono- 
polize power  and  profit. 

I  do  not  mean  by  this  declaration  to  condemn  those  who 
believe  otherwise  ;  they  have  the  same  right  to  their  belief 
as  I  have  to  mine.  But  it  is  necessary  to  the  happiness  of 
man,  that  he  be  mentally  faithful  to  himself.  Infidelity  does 
not  consist  in  believing,  or  in  disbelieving  ;  it  consists  ia 
professing  to  believe  what  he  does  not  believe. 

It  is  impossible  to  calculate  the  moral  mischief,  if  I  may 
so  express  it,  that  mental  lying  has  produced  in  society. 
When  a  man  has  so  far  corrupted  and  prostituted  the 
chastity  of  his  mind,  as  to  subscribe  his  professional  belief 
to  things  he  does  not  believe,  he  has  prepared  himself  for 
the  commission  of  every  other  crime.  He  takes  up  the  trade 
of  a  priest  for  the  sake  of  gain,  and,  in  order  to  qualify 
himself  for  that  trade,  he  begins  with  a  perjury.  Can  we 
conceive  anything  more  destructive  to  morality  than  this  ? 

Soon  after  I  had  published  the  pamphlet, "  COMMON  SENSE/ 
in  America,  I  saw  the  exceeding  probability  that  a  revolvtion 
in  the  system  of  government  would  be  followed  by  a  revolu- 
tion in  the  system  of  religion.  The  adulterous  connection  of 
church  and  state,  wherever  it  had  taken  place,  whether 
Jewish,  Christian,  or  Turkish,  had  so  effectually  prohibited, 
by  pains  and  penalties,  every  discussion  upon  established 
creeds,  and  upon  first  principles  of  religion,  that  until  the 
system  of  government  should  be  changed,  those  subjects  could 
not  be  brought  fairly  and  openly  before  the  world  ;  but  that 
whenever  this  should  be  done,  a  revolution  in  the  system  of 
religion  would  follow.  Human  inventions  and  priest-craft 
would  be  detected ;  and  man  would  return  to  the  pure, 
unmixed,  and  unadulterated  belief  of  one  God,  and  no  more. 

Every  national  church  or  religion  has  established  itself  by 
pretending  some  special  mission  from  God,  communicated  to 
certain  individuals.  The  Jews  have  their  Moses  ;  the  Christ- 
ians their  Jesus  Christ,  their  apostles  and  saints ;  and  the 
Turks  their  Mahomet,  as  if  the  way  to  God  was  not  open  to 
every  man  alike. 

Each  of  those  churches  show  certain  books,  which  they 
call  revelation,  or  the  word  of  God.  The  Jews  say,  that  their 


[PART  i.  THE  AGE  OF  SEASON.  7 

word  of  God  was  given  by  God  to  Moses,  face  to  face  ;  the 
Christians  say,  that  their  word  of  God  came  by  divine 
inspiration  ;  and  the  Turks  say,  that  their  word  of  God  (the 
Koran)  was  brought  by  an  angel  from  Heaven.  Each  of 
those  churches  accuse  the  other  of  unbelief ;  and,  for  my  own 
part,  I  disbelieve  them  all. 

As  it  is  necessary  to  affix  right  ideas  to  words,  I  will,  before 
I  proceed  further  into  the  subject,  offer  some  other  observations 
or.  the  word  revelation.  Revelation  when  applied  to  religion, 
means  something  communicated  immediately  from  God  to  man. 

No  one  will  deny  or  dispute  the  power  of  the  Almighty 
to  make  such  a  communication,  if  he  pleases.  But  admitting, 
for  the  sake  of  a  case,  that  something  has  been  revealed  to 
a  certain  person,  and  not  revealed  to  any  other  person,  it  is 
revelation  to  that  person  only.  When  he  tells  it  to  a  second 
person,  a  second  to  a  third,  a  third  to  a  fourth,  and  so  on,  it 
ceases  to  be  a  revelation  to  all  those  persons.  It  is  revelation 
to  the  first  person  only,  smdhearsay  to  every  other,  and,  con 
sequently,  they  are  not  obliged  to  believe  it. 

It  is  a  contradiction  in  terms  and  ideas,  to  call  anything 
a  revelation  that  come*  to  us  at  second-hand,  either  verbally 
or  in  writing.  Revelation  is  necessarily  limited  to  the  first 
communication — after  this,  it  is  only  an  account  of  something 
which  that  person  says  was  a  revelation  made  to  him ;  and 
though  he  may  find  himself  obliged  to  believe  it,  it  cannot  be 
incumbent  on  me  to  believe  it  in  the  same  manner  :  for  it 
was  not  a  revelation  made  to  me,  and  I  have  only  his  word 
for  it  that  it  was  made  to  him. 

When  Moses  told  the  children  of  Israel  that  he  received 
the  two  tables  of  the  commandments  from  the  hands  of  God, 
they  were  not  obliged  to  believe  him,  because  they  had  no 
other  authority  for  it  than  his  telling  them  so  ;  and  I  have 
no  other  authority  for  it  than  some  historian  telling  me  so. 
The  commandments  carry  no  internal  evidence  of  divinity 
with  them ;  they  contain  some  good  moral  precepts  such  as 
any  man  qualified  to  be  a  lawgiver,  or  a  legislature,  could 
produos  himself,  without  having  recourse  to  supernatural 
intervention.* 

When  I  am  told  that  the  Koran  was  written  in  Heaven, 
and  brought  to  Mahomet  by  an  angel,  the  account  comes  too 
near  the  same  kind  of  heresay  evidence  and  second-hand 

*  It  is,  however,  necessary  to  except  the  declaration  which  says  that  God 
visits  the  sins  of the  fathers  upon  the  children ;  it  ia  contrary  to  every  principle 
•f  Boral  jnatioe. 


8  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  [PAET  I. 

authority  as  the  former.    I  did  not  see  the  angel  myself,  and, 
therefore,  I  have  a  right  not  to  believe  it. 

When  also  I  am  told  that  a  woman  called  the  Virgin 
Mary,  said,  or  gave  out,  that  she  was  with  child  without  any 
cohabitation  with  a  man,  and  that  her  betrothed  husband, 
Joseph,  said  that  an  angel  told  him  so,  I  have  a  ?ight  to 
believe  them  or  not ;  such  a  circumstance  required  a  much 
stronger  evidence  than  their  bare  word  for  it ;  but  we  have 
not  even  this — for  neither  Joseph  nor  Mary  wrote  any  such 
matter  themselves  ;  it  is  only  reported  by  others  that  they 
said  so — it  is  hearsay  upon  hearsay,  and  I  do  not  choose  to 
rest  my  belief  upon  such  evidence. 

It  is,  however,  not  difficult  to  account  for  the  credit  that 
was  given  to  the  story  of  Jesus  Christ  being  the  son  of  God. 
He  was  born  when  the  heathen  mythology  had  still  some 
fashion  and  repute  in  the  world,  and  that  mythology  had 
prepared  the  people  for  the  belief  of  such  a  story.  Almost 
all  the  extraordinary  men  that  lived  under  the  heathen  my- 
thology were  reputed  to  be  the  sons  of  some  of  their  gods.  It 
was  not  a  new  thing,  at  that  time,  to  believe  a  man  to  have 
been  celestially  begotten  ;  the  intercourse  of  gods  with  women 
was  then  a  matter  of  familiar  opinion.  Their  Jupiter,  accord- 
ing to  their  accounts,  had  cohabited  with  hundreds  ;  the  story 
therefore  had  nothing  in  it  either  new,  wonderful  or  obscene  ; 
it  was  conformable  to  the  opinions  that  then  prevailed  among 
the  people  called  Gentiles,  or  Mythologists,  and  it  was  those 
people  only  that  believed  it.  The  Jews,  who  had  kept 
strictly  to  the  belief  of  one  God,  and  no  more,  and  who  had 
always  rejected  the  heathen  mythology,  never  credited  the 
story. 

It  is  curious  to  observe  how  the  theory  of  what  is  called 
the  Christian  Church,  sprung  out  of  the  tail  of  heathen  my- 
thology. A  direct  incorporation  took  place  in  the  first  in- 
stance, by  making  the  reputed  founder  to  be  celestially  begot- 
ten. The  trinity  of  gods  that  then  followed  was  no  other 
than  a  reduction  of  the  former  plurality,  which  was  about 
twenty  or  thirty  thousand  ;  the  statue  of  Mary  succeeded  the 
statue  of  Diana  of  Ephesus  ;  the  deification  of  heroes  change 
into  the  canonization  of  saints  ;  the  mythologists  had  gods 
for  everything ;  the  Christian  Mythologists  had  saints 
for  everything  ;  the  church  became  as  crowded  with  the 
one,  as  the  pantheon  had  been  with  the  other ;  and  Rome 
was  the  place  of  both.  The  Christian  theory  is  little  else  than 
tfce  idolatry  of  the  ancient  Mythologists,  accommodated  to  the 


PART   f.]  THE   AGE   OP   REASON. 

purposes  of  power  and  revenue  ;  and  it  yet  remains  <* 
and  philosophy  to  abolish  the  amphibious  fraud. 

Nothing  that  is  here  said  can  apply  even  with  the  most 
distant  disrespect,  to  the  real  character  of  Jesus  Christ.  He 
was  a  virtuous  and  an  amiable  man.  The  moiality  that  he 
preached  and  practised  was  of  the  most  benevolent  kind ; 
and  though  similar  systems  of  morality  had  been  preached  by 
Confucius,  and  by  some  of  the  Greek  philosophers,  many 
years  before  ;  by  the  Quakers  since  ;  and  by  many  good  men 
m  all  ages,  it  has  not  been  exceeded  by  any. 

Jesus  Christ  wrote  no  account  of  himself,  of  his  birth, 
parentage,  or  anything  else  ;  not  a  line  of  what  is  called  the 
New  Testament  is  of  his  own  writing.  The  history  of  him  is 
altogether  the  work  of  other  people  ;  and  as  to  the  account 
given  of  his  resurrection  and  ascension,  it  was  the  necessary 
counterpart  to  the  story  of  his  birth.  His  historians,  having 
brought  him  into  the  world  in  a  supernatural  manner,  were 
obliged  to  take  him  out  again  in  the  same  manner,  or  the 
first  part  of  the  story  must  have  fallen  to  the  ground. 

The  wretched  contrivance  with  which  this  latter  part  ia 
told,  exceeds  everything  that  went  before  it.  The  first  part, 
that  of  the  miraculous  conception,  was  not  a  thing  that 
admitted  of  publicity  ;  and  therefore  the  tellers  of  this  part 
of  the  story  had  this  advantage,  that  though  they  might  not 
be  credited,  they  could  not  be  detected.  They  could  not  be 
expected  to  prove  it,  because  it  was  not  one  of  those  things 
that  admitted  of  proof,  and  it  was  impossible  that  the  person 
of  whom  it  was  told  could  prove  it  himself. 

But  the  resurrection  of  a  dead  person  from  the  grave, 
and  his  ascension  through  the  air,  is  a  thing  very  different  as 
to  the  evidence  it  admits  of,  to  the  invisible  conception  of  a 
child  in  the  womb.  The  resurrection  and  ascension,  suppos- 
ing them  to  have  taken  place,  admitted  of  public  and  occular 
demonstration,  like  that  of  the  ascension  of  a  balloon,  or  the 
gun  at  noon  day,  to  all  Jerusalem  at  least.  A  thing  which 
everybody  is  required  to  believe,  requires  that  the  proof  and 
evidence  of  it  should  be  equal  to  all,  and  universal ;  and  as 
the  public  visibility  of  this  last  related  act,  was  the  onl) 
evidence  that  could  give  sanction  to  the  former  part,  the 
whole  of  it  falls  to  the  ground,  because  that  evidence  never 
was  given.  Instead  of  this,  a  small  number  of  persons,  not 
more  than  eight  or  nine,  are  introduced  as  proxies  for  the 
whole  world,  to  say  they  saw  it,  and  all  the  rest  of  the  world 
are  called  upon  to  believe  it.  But  it  appears  that  Thomas  did 


10      .  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  [PART   ). 

not  belie  re  the  resurrection  ;  and,  as  they  say,  would  not  be- 
lieve without  having  occular  and  manual  demonstration  him- 
self. So  neither  unll  I,  and  the  reason  is  equally  as  good  for 
me,  and  for  every  other  person,  as  for  Thomas. 

It  is  in  vain  to  attempt  to  palliate  or  disguise  this  matter. 
The  story,  so  far  as  relates  to  the  supernatural  part,  has 
every  mark  of  fraud  and  imposition  stamped  upon  the  face 
of  it.  Who  were  the  authors  of  it  is  as  impossible  for  its 
now  to  know,  as  it  is  for  us  to  be  assured,  that  the  books  in 
which  the  account  is  related,  were  written  by  the  persons 
whose  names  they  bear  ;  the  best  surviving  evidence  we  now 
have  respecting  this  affair  is  the  Jews.  They  are  regularly 
descended  from  the  people  who  lived  in  the  time  this  resur- 
rection and  ascensions  is  said  to  have  happened,  and  they 
say,  it  is  not  true,  It  has  long  appeared  to  me  a  strange  in- 
consistency to  cite  the  Jews  as  a  proof  of  the  truth  of  the 
Btory.  It  is  just  the  same  as  if  a  man  were  to  say,  I  will 
prove  the  truth  of  what  I  have  told  you,  by  producing  the 
people  who  say  it  is  false. 

That  such  a  person  as  Jesus  Christ  existed,  and  that  he 
was  crucified,  which  was  the  mode  of  execution  at  that  day, 
are  historical  relations  strictly  within  the  limits  of  pro- 
bability. He  preached  most  excellent  morality,  and  the 
equality  of  man  ;  but  he  preached  also  against  the  corruptions 
and  avarice  of  the  Jewish  priests,  and  this  brought  upon  him 
the  hatred  and  vengeance  of  the  whole  order  of  priesthood. 
The  accusation  which  those  priests  brought  against  him  was 
that  of  sedition  and  conspiracy  against  the  Roman  govern- 
ment, to  which  the  Jews  were  then  subject  and  tributary  ; 
and  it  is  not  improbable  that  the  Roman  government  might 
have  some  secret  apprehensions  of  the  effects  of  his  doctrine 
as  well  as  the  Jewish  priests  ;  neither  is  it  improbable  that 
Jesus  Christ  had  in  contemplation  the  delivery  of  the  Jewish 
nation  from  the  bondage  of  the  Romans.  Between  the  two, 
however,  this  virtuous  reformer  and  revolutionist  lost  his 
life. 

It  is  upon  this  plain  narrative  of  facts,  together  with 
another  case  I  am  going  to  mention,  that  the  Christian  My 
thologists,  calling  themselves  the  Christian  Church,  have 
erected  their  fable,  which,  for  absurdity  and  extravagance,  is 
not  exceeded  by  anything  that  is  to  be  found  in  the  mytho- 
logy of  the  ancients. 

The  ancient  Mythologists  tell  us  that  the  race  of  Giants 
made  war  against  Jupiter,  and  that  one  of  them  threw  a 


[PART  I.  THE  AGE  OF  REASON.  11 

hundred  rocks  against  him  at  one  throw ;  that  Jupiter 
defeated  him  with  thunder,  and  confined  him  afterward? 
under  Mount  Etna,  and  that  every  time  the  Giant  turns  him- 
self, Mount  Etna  belches  fire. 

It  is  here  easy  to  see  that  the  circumstance  of  the  mount- 
ain, that  of  its  being  a  volcano,  suggested  the  idea  of  the 
fable ;  and  that  the  fable  is  made  to  fit  and  wind  itself  up 
with  that  circumstance. 

The  Christian  Mythologists  tell  us,  that  their  Satan  made 
war  against  the  Almighty,  who  defeated  him,  and  confined 
him  afterwards,  not  under  a  mountain,  but  in  a  pit.  It  is 
here  easy  to  see  that  the  first  fable  suggested  the  idea  of  the 
second  ;  for  the  fable  of  Jupiter  and  the  Giants  was  told 
many  hundred  years  before  that  of  Satan. 

Thus  far  the  ancient  and  the  Christian  Mythologists  differ 
very  little  from  each  other.  But  the  latter  have  contrived 
to  carry  the  matter  much  farther.  They  have  contrived  to 
connect  the  fabulous  part  of  the  story  of  Jesus  Christ  with 
the  fable  originating  from  Mount  Etna ;  and,  in  order  to 
make  all  the  parts  of  the  story  tie  together,  they  have  taken 
to  their  aid  the  traditions  of  the  Jews  ;  for  the  Christian 
mythology  is  made  up  partly  from  the  ancient  mythology, 
and  partly  from  the  Jewish  traditions. 

The  Christian  Mythologists,  after  having  confined  Satan 
in  a  pit,  were  obliged  to  let  him  out  again  to  bring  on  the 
sequel  of  the  fable.  He  is  then  introduced  into  the  Garden 
of  Eden  in  the  shape  of  a  snake  or  a  serpent,  and  in  that 
shape  he  enters  into  familiar  conversation  with  Eve,  who  is 
no  way  surprised  to  hear  a  snake  talk  ;  and  the  issue  of  this 
tete-a-tete  is,  that  he  persuades  her  to  eat  an  apple,  and  the 
eating  of  that  apple  damns  all  mankind. 

After  giving  Satan  this  triumph  over  the  whole  creation, 
one  would  have  supposed  that  the  church  Mythologists  would 
have  been  kind  enough  to  send  him  back  to  the  pit :  or,  if 
they  had  not  done  this,  that  they  would  have  put  a  mountain 
upon  him,  (for  they  say  that  their  faith  can  remove  a  mount- 
ain) or  have  put  him  under  a  mountain,  as  the  former  Mytho- 
logists had  done,  to  prevent  his  getting  again  among  the 
women  and  doing  more  mischief.  But  instead  of  this,  they 
l«ave  him  at  large,  without  even  obliging  him  to  give  Ida 
parole — the  secret  of  which  is,  that  they  could  not  do  with- 
out him  ;  and  after  being  at  the  trouble  of  making  him,  they 
bribed  him  to  stay.  They  promised  him  ALL  the  Jews,  ALL 
the  Turks  by  anticipation,  nine-tenths  of  the  world  beside, 


12  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  [PABT  L 

and  Mahomet  into  the  bargain.  After  this,  who  can  doubi 
the  bountifulness  of  the  Christian  mythology. 

Having  thus  made  an  insurrection  and  a  battle  in 
Heaven,  in  which  none  of  the  combatants  could  be  either 
killed  or  wounded — put  Satan  into  the  pit — let  him  out 
again — giving  him  a  triumph  over  the  whole  creation — 
damned  all  mankind  by  the  eating  of  an  apple,  these  Chris- 
tian Mythologists  bring  the  two  ends  of  their  fable  together. 
They  represent  this  virtuous  and  amiable  man,  Jesus  Christ, 
to  be  at  once  both  God  and  Man,  and  also  the  Son  of  God. 
celestially  begotten,  on  purpose  to  be  sacrificed,  because  they 
say  that  Eve  in  her  longing  had  eaten  an  apple. 

Putting  aside  everything  that  might  excite  laughter  by 
its  absurdity,  or  detestation  by  its  profaneness,  and  confining 
ourselves  merely  to  an  examination  of  the  parts,  it  is  impos- 
sible to  conceive  a  story  more  derogatory  to  the  Almighty, 
more  inconsistent  with  his  wisdom,  more  contradictory  to 
his  power,  than  this  story  is. 

In  order  to  make  for  it  a  foundation  to  rise  upon,  the  in- 
ventors were  under  the  necessity  of  giving  to  the  being, 
whom  they  call  Satan,  a  power  equally  as  great,  if  not 
greater  than  they  attribute  to  the  Almighty.  They  have 
not  only  given  him  the  power  of  liberating  himself  from  the 
pit,  after  what  they  call  his  fall,  but  they  have  made  that 
power  increase  afterwards  to  infinity.  Before  this  fall  they 
represent  him  only  as  an  angel  of  limited  existence,  as  they 
represent  the  rest.  After  his  fall,  he  becomes,  by  their 
account,  omnipresent.  He  exists  everywhere,  and  at  the 
same  time.  He  occupies  the  whole  immensity  of  space. 

Not  content  with  this  deification  of  Satan,  they  represent 
him  as  defeating,  by  stratagem,  in  the  shape  of  an  animal  of 
the  creation,  all  the  power  and  wisdom  of  the  Almiguty. 
They  represent  him  as  having  compelled  the  Almighty  to  the 
direct  necessity  either  of  surrendering  the  whole  of  the  crea- 
tion to  the  government  and  sovereignty  of  this  Satan,  or  of 
capitulating  for  its  redemption  by  coming  down  upon  earth, 
and  exhibiting  himself  upon  a  cross  in  the  shape  of  a  man. 

Had  the  inventors  of  this  story  told  it  the  contrary  way, 
that  is,  had  they  represented  the  Almighty  as  compelling 
Satan  to  exhibit  himself  on  a  cross,  in  the  shape  of  a  snake, 
as  a  punishment  for  his  new  transgression,  the  story  would 
have  been  less  absurd — less  contradictory.  But,  instead  ox 
this,  they  make  the  transgressor  triumph,  and  the  Almighty 
fall. 


{PABT  I.  THE  AGE  OF  REASON  j  j 

That  many  good  men  have  believed  this  strange  fable, 
and  lived  very  good  lives  under  that  belief  (for  credulity  ia 
not  a  crime)  is  what  I  have  no  doubt  of.  In  the  first  place, 
they  were  educated  to  believe  it,  and  they  would  have  be- 
lieved anything  else  in  the  same  manner.  There  are  also 
many  who  have  been  so  enthusiastically  enraptured  by  what 
they  conceived  to  be  the  infinite  love  of  God  to  man,  in 
making  a  sacrifice  of  himself,  that  the  vehemence  of  the  idea 
has  forbidden  and  deterred  them  from  examining  into  the 
absurdity  and  profaneness  of  the  story.  The  more  unnatural 
anything  is,  the  more  is  it  capable  of  becoming  the  object  of 
dismal  admiration. 

But  if  objects  for  gratitude  and  admiration  are  our  desire, 
do  they  not  present  themselves  every  hour  to  our  eyes  ?  Do 
we  not  see  a  fair  creation  prepared  to  receive  us  the  instant 
we  are  born — a  world  furnished  to  our  hands,  that  cost  us 
nothing  ?  Is  it  we  that  light  up  the  sun,  that  pour  down  the 
rain,  and  fill  the  earth  with  abundance  ?  Whether  we  sleep 
or  wake,  the  vast  machinery  of  the  universe  still  goes  on. 
Are  these  things,  and  the  blessings  they  indicate  in  future, 
nothing  to  us?  Can  our  gross  feelings  be  excited  by  no 
other  subjects  than  tragedy  and  suicide  ?  Or  is  the  gloomy 
pride  of  man  become  so  intolerable,  that  nothing  can  flatter 
it  but  a  sacrifice  of  the  Creator  ? 

I  know  that  this  bold  investigation  will  alarm  many,  but 
it  would  be  paying  too  great  a  compliment  to  their  credulity 
to  forbear  it  on  that  account ;  the  times  and  the  subject 
demand  it  to  be  done.  The  suspicion  that  the  theory  of 
what  is  called  the  Christian  church  is  fabulous,  is  becoming 
very  extensive  in  all  countries  ;  and  it  will  be  a  consolation 
to  men  staggering  under  that  suspicion,  and  doubting  what 
to  believe  and  what  to  disbelieve,  to  see  the  subject  freely 
investigated.  I  therefore  pass  on  to  an  examination  of  the 
books  called  the  Old  and  New  Testament. 

These  books,  beginning  with  Genesis  and  ending  witb 
Revelation,  (which,  by  the  bye,  is  a  book  of  riddles  that 
requires  a  revelation  to  explain  it)  are,  we  are  told,  the 
word  of  God.  It  is,  therefore,  proper  for  us  to  know  who 
told  us  so,  that  we  may  know  what  credit  to  give  to  the 
report.  The  answer  to  this  question  is,  that  nobody  can  tell, 
except  that  we  tell  one  another  so.  The  case,  however, 
historically  appears  to  be  as  follows  : 

When  the  church  Mythologists  established  their  system, 
they  collected  all  the  writings  they  could  find,  and  managed 


14  THE  AGE   OP    REASON.  [PAET  L 

them  as  they  pleased.  It  is  a  matter  altogether  of  uncer- 
tainty to  us  whether  such  of  the  writings  as  now  appear 
under  the  name  of  the  Old  and  New  Testament,  are  in  the 
same  state  in  which  those  collectors  say  they  found  them,  or 
whether  they  added,  altered,  abridged,  or  dressed  them  up. 

Be  this  as  it  may,  they  decided  by  vote  which  of  the  books 
out  of  the  collection  they  had  made,  should  be  the  WORD  OF 
GOD,  and  which  should  not.  They  rejected  several ;  they 
voted  others  to  be  doubtful,  such  as  the  books  called  the 
Apocrypha  ;  and  those  books  which  had  a  majority  of  votes, 
were  voted  to  be  the  word  of  God.  Had  they  voted  other- 
wise, all  the  people,  since  calling  themselves  Christians,  had 
believed  otherwise — for  the  belief  of  the  one  comes  from  the 
vote  of  the  other.  Who  the  people  were  that  did  all  this, 
we  know  nothing  of,  they  called  themselves  by  the  general 
name  of  the  Church  ;  and  this  is  all  we  know  of  the  matter. 

A.S  we  have  no  other  external  evidence  or  authority  for 
believing  these  books  to  be  the  word  of  God,  than  what  I 
have  mentioned,  which  is  no  evidence  or  authority  at  all,  I 
come,  in  the  next  place,  to  examine  the  internal  evidence 
contained  in  the  books  themselves. 

In  the  former  part  of  this  Essay,  I  have  spoken  of  revela- 
tion.— I  now  proceed  further  with  that  subject,  for  the 
purpose  of  applying  it  to  the  books  in  question. 

Revelation  is  a  communication  of  something,  which  the 
person,  to  whom  that  thing  is  revealed,  did  not  know  before. 
For  if  I  have  done  a  thing,  or  seen  it  done,  it  needs  no 
revelation  to  tell  me  I  have  done  it,  or  seen  it,  nor  to  enable 
me  to  tell  it,  or  to  write  it. 

Revelation,  therefore,  cannot  be  applied  to  anything  done 
upon  earth,  of  which  man  is  himself  the  actor  or  the  witness ; 
and  consequently  all  the  historical  and  anecdotal  part  of  the 
Bible,  which  is  almost  the  whole  of  it,  is  not  within  the 
meaning  and  compass  of  the  word  revelation,  and,  therefore, 
is  not  the  word  of  God. 

When  Sampson  ran  off  with  the  gate-posts  of  Gaza,  if  he 
ever  did  so,  (and  whether  he  did  or  not  is  nothing  to  us,)  or 
when  he  visited  his  Delilah,  or  caught  his  foxes,  or  did  any 
thing  else,  what  has  revelation  to  do  with  these  things  ?  If 
they  were  facts,  he  could  tell  them  himself ;  or  his  secretary, 
if  he  kept  one,  could  write  them,  if  they  were  worth  either 
telling  or  writing ;  and  if  they  were  fictious,  revelation  could 
not  make  them  true  ;  and  whether  true  or  not,  we  are  neither 
the  better  nor  the  wiser  for  knowing  them.  When  we  con 


[P1BT  L  THE  AGE   OF   REASON  16 

template  the  immensity  of  that  Being,  who   directs  and 

foverns  the  incomprehensible  WHOLE,  of  whicn  the  utmost 
en  of  human  sight  can  discover  but  a  part,  we  ought  to  feel 
shame  at  calling  such  paltry  stories  the  word  of  God. 

As  to  the  account  of  the  Creation,  with  which  the  books 
of  Genesis  opens,  it  has  all  the  appearance  of  being  a  tradi- 
tion which  the  Israelites  had  among  them  before  they  came 
into  Egypt ;  and  after  their  departure  from  that  country, 
they  put  it  at  the  head  of  their  history,  without  telling  (as  it 
is  most  probable)  that  they  did  not  know  how  they  came  by 
it.  The  manner  in  which  the  account  opens,  shows  it  to  be 
traditionary.  It  begins  abruptly  :  it  is  nobody  that  speaks  ; 
it  is  nobody  that  hears  ;  it  is  addressed  to  nobody ;  it  has 
neither  first,  second,  or  third  person  ;  it  has  every  criterion 
of  being  a  tradition,  it  has  no  voucher.  Moses  does  not 
take  it  upon  himself  by  introducing  it  with  the  formality 
that  he  uses  on  other  occasions,  such  as  that  of  saying.  The 
Lord  spake  unto  Moses,  saying. 

Why  it  has  been  called  the  Mosaic  account  of  the 
Creation,  I  am  at  a  loss  to  conceive.  Moses,  I  believe,  was 
too  good  a  judge  of  such  subjects  to  put  his  name  to  that 
account.  He  had  been  educated  among  the  Egyptians,  who 
were  a  people  as  well  skilled  in  science,  and  particularly  in 
astronomy,  as  any  people  of  their  day  ;  and  the  silence  and 
caution  that  Moses  observes,  in  not  authenticating  the 
account,  is  a  good  negative  evidence  that  he  neither  told  it 
nor  believed  it. — The  case  is,  that  every  nation  of  people 
has  been  world-makers,  and  the  Israelites  had  as  much  right 
to  set  up  the  trade  of  world-making  as  any  of  the  rest ;  and 
as  Moses  was  not  an  Israelite,  he  might  not  choose  to  con- 
tradict the  tradition.  'The  account,  however,  is  harmless  ; 
and  this  is  more  than  can  be  said  of  many  other  parts  of  the 
Bible. 

Whenever  we  read  the  obscene  stories,  the  voluptuous 
debaucheries,  the  cruel  and  torturous  executions,  the  unre- 
lenting vindictiveness,  with  which  more  than  half  the  Bible 
is  filled,  it  would  be  more  consistent  that  we  called  it  the 
word  of  a  demon,  than  the  word  of  God.  It  is  a  history  of 
wickedness,  that  has  served  to  corrupt  and  brutalize  man- 
kind ;  and,  for  my  own  part,  I  sincerely  detest  it,  as  I  detest 
everything  that  is  cruel. 

We  scarcely  meet  with  anything,  a  few  phrases  excepted, 
but  what  deserves  either  our  abhorrence  or  our  contempt,  till 
we  come  to  the  miscellaneous  parts  of  the  Bible.  In  thf 


16  THE    AGE    OF    REASON.  [PART   I 

anonymous;  publications,  the  Psalms,  and  the  Book  of  Job. 
more  particularly  in  the  latter,  we  find  a  great  deal  of 
elevated  sentiment  reverentially  expressed  of  the  power  and 
benignity  of  the  Almighty  ;  but  they  stand  on  no  higher 
rank  than  many  other  compositions  on  similar  subjects,  as 
well  before  that  time  as  since. 

The  Proverbs  which  are  said  to  be  Solomon's,  though 
most  probably  a  collection,  (because  they  discover  a  knowl- 
edge of  life,  which  his  situation  excluded  him  from  knowing) 
are  an  instructive  table  of  ethics.  They  are  inferior  in 
keenness  to  the  proverbs  of  the  Spaniards,  and  not  more 
wise  and  economical  than  those  of  the  American  Franklin. 

All  the  remaining  parts  of  the  Bible,  generally  known  by 
the  name  of  the  Prophets,  are  the  works  of  the  Jewish  poets 
and  itinerant  preachers,  who  mixed  poetry,  anecdote,  and 
devotion  together — and  those  works  still  retain  the  air  and 
style  of  poetry,  though  in  translation.* 

There  is  not,  throughout  the  whole  book  called  the  Bible, 
any  word  that  describes  to  us  what  we  call  a  poet,  nor  any 
word  that  describes  what  we  call  poetry.  The  case  is,  that 

*  As  there  are  many  readers  who  do  not  see  that  a  composition  is  poetry, 
unless  it  be  in  rhyme,  it  is  for  their  information  that  I  add  this  note. 

Poetry  consists  principally  in  two  things — imagery  and  composition.  The 
composition  of  poetry  differs  from  that  of  prose  in  the  manner  of  mixing  long 
and  short  syllables  together.  Take  a  long  syllable  out  of  a  line  of  poetry,  and 
put  a  short  one  in  the  room  of  it,  or  put  a  long  syllable  where  a  short  one 
should  be,  and  that  line  will  lose  its  poetical  harmony.  It  will  have  an  effect 
upon  the  line  like  that  of  misplacing  a  note  in  a  song. 

The  imagery  in  these  books,  called  the  prophets,  appertains  altogether  to 
poetry.  It  is  fictitious,  and  often  extravagant,  and  not  admissible  in  any 
other  kind  of  writing  than  poetry. 

To  show  that  these  writings  are  composed  in  poetical  numbers,  I  will  take 
ten  syllables,  as  they  stand  in  the  book,  and  make  a  line  of  the  same  number 
of  syllables,  (heroic  measure)  that  shall  rhyme  with  the  last  word.  It  will 
then  be  seen  that  the  composition  of  these  books  is  poetical  measure.  The 
instance  I  shall  produce  is  from  Isaiah  : — 

"  Htar,  0  ye  heavens,  and  give  ear  0  earth  /'' 
"Tis  God  himself  that  calls  attention  forth. 

-AffTfrther  instance  I  shall  quote  is  from  the  mournful  Jeremiah,  to  which 
I  shall  acid  two  other  lines,  for  the  purprse  of  carrying  out  the  figure,  and 
Aowiog  the  intention  of  the  poet. 

"  D,  that  mine  head  were  waters  and  mine  eyet" 
Were  fountains  flowing  like  the  liquid  skies  ; 
Tiien  would  I  give  the  mighty  flood  release, 
And  weep  a  deluge  for  the  human  race. 


(PART  I.  THE  AGE  OF  REASON.  17 

the  word  prophet,  to  which  latter  times  have  affixed  a  new 
idea,  was  the  Bible  word  for  poet,  and  the  word  prophesying 
meant  the  art  of  making  poetry.  It  also  meant  the  art  of 
playing  poetry  to  a  tune  upon  any  instrument  of  music. 

We  read  of  prophesying  with  pipes,  tabrets,  and  horns— 
of  prophesying  with  harps,  with  psalteries,  with  cymbals, 
and  with  every  other  instrument  of  music  then  in  fashion. 
Were  we  now  to  speak  of  prophesying  with  a  fiddle,  or  with 
i  pipe  and  tabor,  the  expression  would  have  no  meaning,  or 
would  appear  ridiculous,  and  to  some  people  contemptuous, 
because  we  have  changed  the  meaning  of  the  word. 

We  are  told  of  Saul  being  among  the  prophets,  and  also 
tiiat  he  prophesied ;  but  we  are  not  told  what  they  prophesied, 
nor  what  he  prophesied.  The  case  is,  there  was  nothing  to 
toll  ;  for  these  prophets  were  a  company  of  musicians  and 
poets,  and  Saul  joined  in  the  concert,  and  this  was  called 
prophesying. 

The  account  given  of  this  affair  in  the  book  called 
Samuel,  is,  that  Saul  met  a  company  of  prophets ;  a  whole 
company  of  them  !  coming  down  with  a  psaltery,  a  tabret,  a 
pipe,  and  a  harp,  and  that  they  prephesied,  and  that  he  pro- 
phesied with  them.  But  it  appears  afterwards,  that  Saul 
prophesied  badly  ;  that  is,  performed  his  part  badly  ;  for  it 
is  said,  that,  an  "  evil  spirit  from  God"*  came  upon  Saul,  and 
he  prophesied. 

Now,  were  there  no  other  passage  in  the  book  called  the 
Bible,  than  this,  to  demonstrate  to  us  that  we  have  lost  the 
original  meaning  of  the  word  prophesy,  and  substituted 
another  meaning  in  its  place,  this  alone  would  be  sufficient ; 
for  it  is  impossible  to  use  and  apply  the  word  prophesy,  in 
the  place  it  is  here  used  and  applied,  if  we  give  to  it  the 
sense  which  latter  times  have  affixed  to  it.  The  manner  in 
which  u  is  here  used  strips  it  of  all  religious  meaning,  and 
shows  that  a  man  might  then  be  a  prophet,  or  he  might 
prophesy,  as  he  may  now  be  a  poet  or  musician,  without  any 
regard  to  the  morality  or  immorality  of  his  character.  The 
word  was  originally  a  term  of  science,  promiscuously  applied 
to  poetry  and  to  music,  and  not  restricted  to  any  subject 
upon  which  poetry  and  music  might  be  exercised. 

*  As  those  men  who  call  themselves  divines  and  commentators,  are  very 
fond  of  puzzling  one  another,  I  leave  them  to  contest  the  meaning  of  the  first 
part  of  the  phrase,  that  of  an  evil  spirit  of  God.  I  keep  to  my  textr-keep 
to  the  moaning  of  the  word  prophesy. 


18  THE   AGE   OF  REASON.  [PART  L 

Deborah  and  Barak  are  called  prophets,  not  because  they 
predicted  anything,  but  because  they  composed  the  poem  or 
song  that  bears  their  name,  in  celebration  of  an  act  already 
done.  David  is  ranked  among  the  prophets,  for  he  was  a 
musician,  and  was  also  reputed  to  be  (though  perhaps  very 
erroneously)  the  author  of  the  Psalms.  But  Abraham,  Isaac, 
and  Jacob  are  not  called  prophets  ;  it  does  not  appear  from 
any  accounts  we  have,  that  they  could  either  sing,  play 
music,  or  make  poetry. 

We  are  told  of  the  greater  and  the  lesser  prophets. 
They  might  as  well  tell  us  of  the  greater  and  the  lesser 
God  ;  for  there  cannot  be  degrees  in  prophesying  consistently 
with  its  modern  sense. — But  there  are  degrees  in  poetry,  and 
therefore  the  phrase  is  reconcileable  to  the  case,  when  we 
understand  by  it  the  greater  and  the  lesser  poets. 

It  is  altogether  unnecessary,  after  this,  to  offer  any 
observations  upon  what  those  men,  styled  prophets,  have 
written.  The  axe  goes  at  once  to  the  root,  by  showing  that 
the  original  meaning  of  the  word  has  been  mistaken,  and 
consequently  all  the  inferences  that  have  been  drawn  from 
those  books,  the  devotional  respect  that  has  been  paid  to 
them,  and  the  labored  commentaries  that  have  been  written 
upon  them,  under  that  mistaken  meaning,  are  not  worth 
disputing  about.  In  many  things,  however,  the  writings  of 
the  Jewish  poets  deserve  a  better  fate  than  that  of  being 
bound  up,  as  they  now  are,  with  the  trash  that  accompanies 
them,  under  the  abused  name  of  the  word  of  God. 

If  we  permit  ourselves  to  conceive  right  ideas  of  things, 
we  must  necessarily  affix  the  idea,  not  only  of  unchangeable- 
ness,  but  of  the  utter  impossibility  of  any  change  taking  place, 
by  any  means  or  accident  whatever,  in  that  which  we  would 
honor  with  the  name  of  the  word  of  God ;  and  therefore  the 
word  of  God  cannot  exist  in  any  written  or  human  language. 

The  continually  progressive  change  to  which  the  meaning 
of  words  is  subject,  the  want  of  an  universal  language  which 
renders  translation  necessary,  the  errors  to  which  translation? 
are  again  subject,  the  mistakes  of  copyists  and  printers,  to- 
gether with  the  possibility  of  wilful  alteration,  are  of  them- 
selves evidences  that  the  human  language,  whether  in  speech 
or  in  print,  cannot  be  the  vehicle  of  the  word  of  God.  The 
word  of  God  exists  in  something  else. 

Did  the  book  called  the  Bible,  excel  in  purity  of  ideas  and 
expression  all  the  books  .now  extant  in  tiie  world,  I  would 
not  take  it  for  my  rule  of  faith,  as  being  the  word  of  C.'>1 


PART   I.]  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  19 

because  the  possibility  would  nevertheless  exist  of  iny  being 
imposed  upon.  But  when  I  see  throughout  the  greater  part 
of  this  book,  scarcely  anything  but  a  history  of  the  grossest 
vices,  and  a  collection  of  the  most  paltry  and  contemptible  tales, 
I  cannot  dishonor  my  Creator  by  calling  it  by  his  name. 

Thus  much  for  the  Bible  ;  I  now  go  on  to  the  book  called 
the  New  Testament !  that  is,  the  new  will,  as  if  there  could 
be  two  wills  of  the  Creator. 

Had  it  been  the  object  or  the  intention  of  Jesus  Christ  to 
establish  a  new  religion,  he  would  undoubtedly  have  written 
the  system  himself,  or  procured  it  to  be  written  in  his  life  time. 
But  there  is  no  publication  extant  authenticated  with  his 
name.  All  the  books  called  the  New  Testament  were  written 
after  his  death.  He  was  a  Jew  by  birth  and  by  profession  ; 
and  he  was  the  son  of  God  in  like  manner  that  every  other 
person  is — for  the  Creator  is  the  Father  of  All. 

The  first  four  books,  called  Mathew,  Mark,  Luke,  and 
John,  do  not  give  a  history  of  the  life  of  Jesus  Christ,  but 
only  detached  anecdotes  of  him.  It  appears  from  these  books, 
that  the  whole  time  of  his  being  a  preacher  was  not  more  than 
eighteen  months  ;  and  it  was  only  during  this  short  time,  that 
those  men  became  acquainted  with  him.  They  make  mention 
of  him  at  the  age  of  twelve  years,  sitting,  they  say,  among 
the  Jewish  doctors,  asking  and  answering  them  questions.  As 
this  was  several  years  before  their  acquaintance  with  him 
began,  it  is  most  probable  they  had  this  anecdote  from  his 
parents.  From  this  time  there  is  no  account  of  him  for  about 
sixteen  years.  Where  he  lived,  or  how  lie  employed  himself 
during  this  interval,  is  not  known.  Most  probably  he  was 
working  at  his  father's  trade,  which  was  that  of  a  carpenter. 
It  does  not  appear  that  he  had  any  school  education,  and  the 
probability  is,  that  he  could  not  write,  for  his  parents  were 
extremely  poor,  as  appears  from  their  not  being  able  to  pay 
for  a  bed  when  he  was  born. 

It  is  somewhat  curious  that  the  three  persons  whose  names 
we  the  most  universally  recorded,  were  of  very  obscure 
parentage.  Moses  was  a  foundling  ;  Jesus  Christ  was  born 
in  a  stable  ;  and  Mahomet  was  a  mule  driver.  The  first  and 
the  last  of  these  men  were  founders  of  different  systems  of  re- 
ligion ;  but  Jesus  Christ  founded  no  new  system.  He  called 
men  to  the  practice  of  moral  virtues,  and  the  belief  of  one 
God.  The  great  trait  in  his  character  is  philanthropy. 

The  manner  in  which  he  was  apprehended,  shows  that  he 
was  not  much  known  at  that  time  ;  and  it  shows  also,  tlvwt  the 


80  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  [PART  I. 

meetings  he  then  held  with  his  followers  were  in  secret ;  and 
that  he  had  given  over  or  suspended  preaching  publicly. 
Judas  could  no  otherwise  betray  him  than  by  giving  informa- 
tion where  he  was,  and  pointing  him  out  to  the  officers  that 
went  to  arrest  him  ;  and  the  reason  for  employing  and  pay- 
ing Judas  to  do  this  could  arise  only  from  the  cause  already 
mentioned,  that  of  his  not  being  much  known,  and  living 
concealed. 

The  idea  of  his  concealment,  not  only  agrees  very  ill  with 
his  reputed  divinity,  but  associates  with  it  something  of  pusil- 
lanimity ;  and  his  being  betrayed,  or  in  other  words,  his  being 
apprehended,  on  the  information  of  one  of  his  followers, 
shows  that  he  did  not.  intend  to  be  apprehended,  and  conse- 
quently that  he  did  not  intend  to  be  crucified. 

The  Christian  Mythologists  tell  us,  that  Christ  died  for 
the  sins  of  the  world,  and  that  he  came  On  purpose  to  die. 
Would  it  not  then  have  been  the  same  if  he  had  died  of  a 
fever  or  of  the  small  pox,  of  old  age,  or  of  anything  else  ? 

The  declaratory  sentence  which,  they  say,  was  passed 
upon  Adam,  in  case  he  eat  of  the  apple,  was  not,  that  tliou 
shalt  surely  be  crucified,  but,  thou  shcdt  surely  die — the 
sentence  of  death,  and  not  the  manner  of  dying.  Cruci- 
fixion, therefore,  or  any  other  particular  manner  of  dying, 
made  no  part  of  the  sentence  that  Adam  was  to  suffer,  and 
consequently,  even  upon  their  own  tactics,  it  could  make  no 
part  of  the  sentence  that  Christ  was  to  suffer  in  the  room  of 
Adam.  A  fever  would  have  done  as  well  as  a  cros?.  if  there 
was  any  occasion  for  either. 

The  sentence  of  death,  which  they  tell  us,  was  thus 
passed  upon  Adam,  must  either  have  meant  dying  naturally, 
that  is,  ceasing  to  live,  or  have  meant  what  these  Mytholo- 
gists call  damnation  ;  and  consequently,  the  act  of  dying  on 
the  part  of  Jesus  Christ,  must,  according  to  their  system, 
apply  as  a  prevention  to  one  or  other  of  these  two  things 
happening  to  Adam  and  to  us. 

That  it  does  not  prevent  our  dying  is  evident,  because 
we  all  die ;  and  if  their  accounts  of  longevity  be  true,  men 
die  faster  since  the  crucifixion  than  before  ;  and  with  respect 
to  the  second  explanation,  (including  with  it  the  natural 
death  of  Jesus  Christ  as  a  substitute  for  the  eternal  death  or 
damnation  of  all  mankind,)  it  is  impertinently  representing 
the  Creator  as  coming  off,  or  revoking  the  sentence,  by  a 
pun  or  a  quibble  upon  the  word  death.  That  manufacturer  of 
quibbles,  St.  Paul,  if  he  wrote  the  books  that  bear  his  name, 


[PABT  I.  THE  AGE  OP   iifiASON  21 

has  helped  this  quibble  on  by  making  another  quibble  upon 
the  word  Adam.  He  makes  there  to  be  two  Adams  ;  the 
one  who  sins  in  fact,  and  suffers  by  proxy  ;  the  other  who 
sins  by  proxy,  and  suffers  in  fact.  A  religion  thus  inter- 
larded with  quibble,  subterfuge,  and  pun,  has  a  tendency  to 
instruct  its  professors  in  the  practice  of  these  arts.  They 
acquire  the  habit  without  being  aware  of  the  cause. 

If  Jesus  Christ  was  the  being  which  those  Mythologisl* 
tell  us  he  was,  and  that  he  came  into  this  world  to  suffer. 
which  is  a  word  they  sometimes  use  instead  of  to  die,  the 
only  real  suffering  he  could  have  endured,  would  have  been 
to  live.  His  existence  here  was  a  state  of  exilement  or 
transportation  from  Heaven,  and  the  way  back  to  his 
original  country  was  to  die. — In  fine,  everything  in  this 
strange  system  is  the  reverse  of  what  it  pretends  to  be.  It 
is  the  reverse  of  truth,  and  I  become  so  tired  of  examining 
into  its  inconsistencies  and  absurdities,  that  I  hasten  to  the 
conclusion  of  it,  in  order  to  proceed  to  something  better. 

How  much,  or  what  parts  of  the  books  called  the  New 
Testament,  were  written  by  the  persons  whose  names  they 
bear,  is  what  we  can  know  nothing  of,  neither  are  we  certain 
in  what  language  they  were  originally  written.  The  mat- 
ters they  now  contain  may  be  classed  under  two  heads — 
anecdote  and  epistolary  correspondence. 

The  four  books  already  mentioned,  Matthew,  Mark, 
Luke,  and  John,  are  altogether  anecdotal.  They  relate 
events  after  they  had  taken  place.  They  tell  what  Jesus 
Christ  did  and  said,  and  what  others  did  and  said  to  him  ; 
and  in  several  instances  they  relate  the  same  event  dif- 
ferently. Revelation  is  necessarily  out  of  the  question  with 
respect  to  those  books ;  not  only  because  of  the  disagree- 
ment of  the  writers,  but  because  revelation  cannot  be  applied 
to  the  relating  of  facts  by  the  person  who  saw  them  done, 
nor  to  the  relating  or  recording  of  any  discourse  or  conver- 
sation by  those  who  heard  it.  The  book  called  the  Acts  of 
the  Apostles  (an  anonymous  work)  belongs  also  to  the 
anecdotal  part. 

All  the  other  parts  of  the  New  Testament,  except  the 
book  of  enigmas,  called  the  Revelations,  are  a  collection  of 
letters  under  the  name  of  epistles  ;  and  the  forgery  of  letters 
has  been  such  a  common  practice  in  the  world,  that  the  pro- 
bability is  at  least  equal,  whether  they  are  genuine  or 
forged.  One  thing,  however,  is  much  less  equivocal,  which 
is,  that  01*  of  the  matters  contained  in  those  books,  together 


92  THE   AGE   OF   REASON  [PAET  I 

with  the  assistance  of  some  old  stories,  the  church  has  set  -ip 
a  system  of  religion  very  contradictory  to  the  character  of 
the  person  whose  name  it  bears.  It  has  set  up  a  religion  of 
pomp  and  of  revenue,  in  pretended  imitation  of  a  person 
whose  life  was  humility  and  poverty. 

The  invention  of  purgatory,  and  of  the  releasing  of  souls 
therefrom,  by  prayers,  bought  of  the  church  with  money  ; 
the  selling  of  pardons,  dispensations  and  indulgencies,  are 
revenue  laws,  without  bearing  that  name  or  carrying  that 
appearance.  But  the  case  nevertheless  is,  that  those  things 
derive  their  origin  from  the  paroxysm  of  the  crucifixion  and 
the  theory  deduced  therefrom,  which  was,  that  one  person 
could  stand  in  the  place  of  another,  and  could  perform 
meritorious  services  for  him.  The  probability,  therefore,  is, 
that  the  whole  theory  or  doctrine  of  what  is  called  the 
redemption  (which  is  said  to  have  been  accomplished  by  the 
act  of  one  person  in  the  room  of  another)  was  originally 
fabricated  on  purpose  to  bring  forward  and  build  all  those 
secondary  and  pecuniary  redemptions  upon  ;  and  that  the 
passages  in  the  books  upon  which  the  idea  of  theory  of 
redemption  is  built,  have  been  manufactured  and  fabricated 
for  that  purpose.  Why  are  we  to  give  this  church  credit, 
when  she  tells  us  that 'those  books  are  genuine  in  every  part, 
any  more  than  we  give  her  credit  for  everything  else  she  has 
told  us  ;  or  for  the  miracles  she  says  she  has  performed  ? 
That  she  could  fabricate  writings  is  certain,  because  she 
could  write  ;  and  the  composition  of  the  writings  in  question, 
is  of  that  kind  that  anybody  might  do  it ;  and  that  she  did 
fabricate  them  is  not  more  inconsistent  with  probability, 
than  that  she  could  tell  us,  as  she  has  done,  that  she  could 
and  did  work  miracles. 

Since,  then,  no  external  evidence  can,  at  this  long 
distance  of  time,  be  produced  to  prove  whether  the  church 
fabricated  the  doctrines  called  redemption  or  not,  (for  such 
evidence,  whether  for  or  against,  would  be  subject  to  the 
same  suspicion  of  being  fabricated,)  the  case  can  only  be  re- 
ferred to  the  internal  evidence  which  the  thing  carries 
within  itself ;  and  this  affords  a  very  strong  presumption  of 
its  being  a  fabrication.  For  the  internal  evidence  is,  that 
the  theory  or  doctrine  of  redemption  has  for  its  basis  an  idea 
of  pecuniary  justice,  and  not  that  of  moral  justice. 

If  I  owe  a  person  money,  and  cannot  pay  him,  and  he 
threatens  to  put  me  in  prison,  another  person  can  take  the 
debt  upon  himself,  and  pay  it  for  me ;  but  if  I  have  com 


[PAST   I.  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  23 

mitted  a  crime,  every  circumstance  of  the  case  is  changed  • 
moral  justice  cannot  take  the  innocent  for  the  guilty  even  if 
the  innocent  would  offer  itself.  To  suppose  justice  to  do 
this,  is  to  destroy  the  principle  of  its  existence,  which  is  the 
thing  itself ;  it  is  then  no  longer  justice  ;  it  is  indiscriminate 
revenge. 

This  single  reflection  will  show  that  the  doctrine  of 
redemption  is  founded  on  a  mere  pecuniary  idea,  correspond- 
ing to  that  of  a  debt,  which  another  person  might  pay  ;  and 
as  this  pecuniary  idea  corresponds  again  with  the  system  of 
gecond  redemptions,  obtained  through  the  means  of  money 
given  to  the  church  for  pardons,  the  probability  is,  that  the 
same  persons  fabricated  both  one  and  the  other  of  those 
theories ;  and  that,  in  truth,  there  is  no  such  thing  as 
redemption  ;  that  it  is  fabulous,  and  that  man  stands  in  the 
same  relative  condition  with  his  Maker  he  ever  did  stand, 
since  man  existed,  and  that  it  is  his  greatest  consolation  to 
think  so. 

Let  him  believe  this,  and  he  will  live  more  consistently 
and  morally,  than  by  any  other  system ;  it  is  by  his  being 
taught  to  contemplate  himself  as  an  out-law,  as  an  out-cast, 
as  a  beggar,  as  a  mumper,  as  one  thrown,  as  it  were,  on  a 
dunghill,  at  an  immense  distance  from  his  Creator,  and  who 
must  make  his  approaches  by  creeping  and  cringing  to 
intermediate  beings,  that  he  conceives  either  a  contemptuous 
disregard  for  everything  under  the  name  of  religion,  or 
becomes  indifferent,  or  turns,  what  he  calls,  devout.  In  the 
latter  case,  he  consumes  his  life  in  grief,  or  the  affectation 
of  it ;  his  prayers  are  reproaches  ;  his  humility  is  ingra- 
titude ;  he  calls  himself  a  worm,  and  the  fertile  earth  a  dung- 
hill ;  and  all  the  blessings  of  life,  by  the  thankless  name  of 
vanities  ;  he  despises  the  choicest  gift  of  God  to  man,  the 
GIFT  OF  REASON  ;  and  having  endeavored  to  force  upon  him- 
self the  belief  of  a  system  against  which  reason  revolts,  he 
ungratefully  calls  it  human  reason,  as  if  man  could  give 
reason  to  himself. 

Yet,  with  all  this  strange  appearance  of  humility,  and 
this  contempt  for  human  reason,  he  ventures  into  the  boldest 
presumptions  ;  he  finds  fault  with  everything  ;  his  selfish- 
ness is  never  satisfied  ;  his  ingratitude  is  never  at  an  end. 
He  takes  on  himself  to  direct  the  Almighty  what  to  do,  even 
in  the  government  of  the  universe  ;  he  prays  dictatorially  ; 
when  it  is  sunshine,  he  prays  for  rain,  and  when  it  is  rain, 
he  prays  for  sunshine  ;  he  follows  the  same  idea  in  every 


24  THE   AGE   OF   KEASON.  [PART  1 

thing  that  he  prays  for  ;  for  what  is  the  amaunt  of  all  his 
prayers,  but  an  attempt  to  make  the  Almighty  change  his 
mind,  and  act  otherwise  than  he  does  ?  It  is  as  if  he  were  to 
say — thou  knowest  not  so  well  as  I. 

But  some  perhaps  will  say — Are  we  to  have  no  word  of 
God — no  revelation?  I  answer,  Yes:  there  is  a  word  of 
God  ;  there  is  a  revelation. 

THE  WORD  OF  GOD  is  THE  CREATION  WE  BEHOLD  :  And  it 
is  in  fMs  word,  which  no  human  invention  can  counterfeit  or 
alter,  that  God  speaketh  universally  to  man. 

Human  language  is  local  and  changeable,  and  is  there- 
fore incapable  of  being  used  as  the  means  of  unchangeable 
and  universal  information.  The  idea  that  God  sent  Jesus 
Christ  to  publish,  as  they  say,  the  glad  tidings  to  all  nations, 
from  one  end  of  the  earth  to  the  other,  is  consistent  only 
with  the  ignorance  of  those  who  knew  nothing  of  the  extent 
of  the  world,  and  who  believed,  as  those  world-saviours 
believed,  and  continued  to  believe,  for  several  centuries, 
(and  that  in  contradiction  to  the  discoveries  of  philosophers 
and  the  experience  of  navigators,)  that  the  earth  was  flat 
like  a  trencher ;  and  that  a  man  might  walk  to  the  end 
of  it. 

But  how  was  Jesus  Christ  to  make  anything  known  ta 
all  nations  ?  He  could  speak  but  one  language,  which  was 
Hebrew ;  and  there  are  in  the  world  several  hundred 
languages.  Scarcely  any  two  nations  speak  the  same  lan- 
guage, or  understand  each  other  ;  and  as  to  translations, 
every  man  who  knows  anything  of  languages,  knows  that  it 
was  impossible  to  translate  from  one  language  to  another, 
not  only  without  losing  a  great  part  of  the  original,  but 
frequently  of  mistaking  the  sense  ;  and  besides  all  this,  the 
art  of  printing  was  wholly  unknown  at  the  time  Christ 
lived. 

It  is  always  necessary  that  the  means  that  are  to  accom- 
plish any  end,  be  equal  to  the  accomplishment  of  that  end,  01 
the  end  cannot  be  accomplished.  It  is  in  this,  that  the 
difference  between  finite  and  infinite  power  and  wisdom  dis- 
covers itself.  Man  frequently  fails  in  accomplishing  his 
ends,  from  a  natural  inability  of  the  power  to  the  purpose  ; 
and  frequently  from  the  want  of  wisdom  to  apply  power 
properly.  But  it  is  impossible  for  infinite  power  and 
wisdom  to  fail  as  man  faileth.  The  means  it  useth  are 
always  equal  to  the  end  ;  but  human  language,  more  especi- 
ally as  there  is  not  an  universal  language,  is  incapable  of 


FABT  I.]  THE    iGB   OF  BEAbOH.  2& 

being  used  as  an  universal  means  of  unchangeable  and 
uniform  information,  and  therefore  it  is  not  the  means  that 
God  useth  in  manifesting  himself  universally  to  man. 

It  is  only  in  the  CREATION  that  all  our  ideas  and  coucep- 
tions  of  a  word  of  God  can  unite.  The  Creation  speaketh 
an  universal  language,  independently  of  human  speech  or 
human  language,  multiplied  and  various  as  they  be.  It  is 
an  ever-existing  original,  which  every  man  can  read.  It 
cannot  be  forged  ;  it  cannot  be  counterfeited  ;  it  cannot  be 
lost ;  it  cannot  be  altered  ;  it  cannot  be  suppressed.  It  does 
not  depend  upon  the  will  of  man  whether  it  shall  be  publish- 
ed or  not ;  it  publishes  itself  from  one  end  of  the  earth  to 
the  other.  It  preaches  to  all  nations  and  to  all  worlds  ;  and 
this  word  of  God  reveals  to  man  all  that  is  necessary  for 
man  to  know  of  God. 

Do  we  want  to  contemplate  his  power?  We  see  it  in 
the  unchangeable  order  by  which  the  incomprehensible 
whole  is  governed.  Do  we  want  to  contemplate  his  munifi- 
cence ?  We  see  it  in  the  abundance  with  which  he  fills  the 
earth.  Do  we  want  to  contemplate  his  mercy  ?  We  see  it 
in  his  not  withholding  that  abundance  even  from  the  un- 
thankful. In  fine,  do  we  want  to  know  what  God  is? 
Search  not  the  book  called  the  Scripture,  which  any  human 
hand  might  make,  but  the  Scripture  called  the  Creation. 

Tlio  on4y  idea  man  can  affix  to  the  name  of  God,  is  that 
of  a  first  cause,  the  cause  of  all  things.  And,  incomprehensi- 
ble and  difficult  as  it  is  for  a  man  to  conceive  what  a  first 
cause  is,  he  arrives  at  the  belief  of  it,  from  the  tenfold 
greater  difficulty  of  disbelieving  it.  It  is  difficult  beyond 
description  to  conceive  that  space  can  have  no  end  ;  but  it  is 
more  difficult  to  conceive  an  end.  It  is  difficult  beyond  the 
power  of  man  to  conceive  an  eternal  duration  of  what  we 
call  time ;  but  it  is  more  impossible  to  conceive  a  time  when 
there  shall  be  no  time. 

In  like  manner  of  reasoning,  everything  we  behold 
carries  in  itself  the  internal  evidence  that  it  did  not  make 
itself.  Every  man  is  an  evidence  to  himself,  that  he  did  not 
make  himself ;  neither  could  his  father  make  himself,  nor  his 
grandfather,  nor  any  of  his  race ;  neither  could  any  tree, 
plant,  or  animal  make  itself ;  and  it  is  the  conviction  arising 
from  this  evidence,  that  carries  us  on,  as  it  were,  by  neces- 
sity, to  the  belief  of  a  first  cause  eternally  existing,  of  a 
nature  totally  different  to  any  material  existence  we  knov 


86  THE   AGE  OF  SEASON.  [PAST  I 

of,  and  by  the  power  of  which  all  things  exist ;  and  this 
first  cause,  man  calls  God. 

It  is  only  by  the  exercise  of  reason,  that  man  can  dis- 
cover God.  Take  away  that  reason,  and  he  would  be  in- 
capable of  understanding  any  thing ;  and,  in  this  case  it 
would  be  just  as  consistent  to  read  even  the  book  called  the 
Bible  to  a  horse  as  to  a  man.  How  then  is  it  that  those 
people  pretend  to  reject  reason  ? 

Almost  the  only  parts  in  the  book  called  the  Bible,  that 
convey  to  us  any  idea  of  God,  are  some  chapters  in  Job, 
and  the  19th  Psalm;  I  recollect  no  other.  .Those  parts  are 
true  deistical  compositions;  for  they  treat  of  the  Deity 
through  his  works.  They  take  the  book  of  Creation  as  the 
word  of  God,  they  refer  to  no  other  book,  and  all  the 
inferences  they  make  are  drawn  from  that  volume. 

I  insert  in  this  place  the  19th  Psalm,  as  paraphrased 
into  English  verse  by  Addison.  I  recollect  not  the  prose, 
and  where  I  write  tins  I  have  not  the  opportunity  of  seeing 
it: 

The  spacious  firmament  on  high, 

With  all  the  blue  etherial  sky, 

And  spangled  heavens,  a  shining  frame, 

Their  great  original  proclaim. 

The  unwearied  sun,  from  day  to  day, 

Does  his  Creator's  power  display  ; 

And  publishes  to  every  land, 

The  work  of  an  Almighty  hand. 

Soon  as  the  evening  shades  prevail, 

The  moon  takes  up  the  wondrous  tale. 

And  nightly  to  the  list'ning  earth, 

Repeats  the  story  of  her  birth  ; 

Whilst  all  the  stars  that  round  her  burn, 

And  all  the  planets,  in  their  turn, 

Confirm  the  tidings  as  they  roll, 

And  spread  the  truth  from  pole  to  pole. 

What  though  in  solemn  silence  all 

Move  round  this  dark  terrestrial  ball ; 

What  though  no  real  voice,  nor  sound, 

Amidst  their  radient  orbs  be  found, 

In  reason's  ear  they  all  rejoice, 

And  utter  forth  a  glorious  voice, 

Forever  singing  as  they  shine, 

THE  HAND  THAT  MADE  US  IS  DlVINB, 

What  more  does  man  want  to  know,  than  that  the  hand 
or  power  that  made  these  things  is  Divine,  is  Omnipotent  1 
Let  him  believe  this  with  the  force  it  is  impossible  to  repel, 
if  he  permits  his  reason  to  act,  and  his  rule  of  moral  life 
will  follow  of  oourae. 


PABT  I.J  THE   AGE   Of    &KA8OH.  9? 

The  allusions  in  Job  have,  all  of  them,  the  same  tend- 
ency with  this  Psalm  ;  that  of  deducing  or  proving  a  truth 
that  would  be  otherwise  unknown,  from  truths  already 
known. 

I  recollect  not  enough  of  the  passages  in  Job  to  insert 
them  correctly :  but  there  is  one  occurs  to  me  that  is  appli- 
cable to  the  subject  I  am  speaking  upon.  "  Canst  thou  by 
searching  find  out  God  ?  Canst  thou  find  out  the  Almighty 
to  perfection  ?" 

I  know  not  how  the  printers  have  pointed  this  passage, 
for  I  keep  no  Bible  ;  but  it  contains  two  distinct  questions 
that  admit  of  distinct  answers. 

First — Canst  thou  by  searching  find  out  God  ?  Yes ; 
because,  in  the  first  place,  I  know  I  did  not  make  myself, 
and  vet  I  have  existence  ;  and  by  searching  into  the  nature 
of  other  things,  I  find  that  no  other  thing  could  make  itself; 
and  yet  millions  of  other  things  exist ;  therefore  it  is,  that 
I  know,  by  positive  conclusion  resulting  from  this  search, 
that  there  is  a  power  superior  to  all  those  things,  and  that 
power  is  God. 

Secondly — Canst  thou  find  out  the  Almighty  to  perfec- 
tion f  No ;  not  only  because  the  power  and  wisdom  He 
has  manifested  in  the  structure  of  the  Creation  that  I  be- 
hold is  to  me  incomprehensible,  but  because  even  this 
manifestation,  great  as  it  is,  is  probably  but  a  small  display 
of  that  immensity  of  power  and  wisdom,  by  which  millions 
of  other  worlds,  to  me  invisible  by  their  distance,  were 
created  and  continue  to  exist. 

It  is  evident  that  both  of  these  questions  are  put  to  the 
reason  of  the  person  to  whom  they  are  supposed  to  have 
been  addressed  ;  and  it  is  only  by  admitting  the  first  ques- 
tion to  be  answered  affirmatively,  that  the  second  could 
follow.  It  would  have  been  unnecessary,  and  even  absurd, 
to  have  put  a  second  question,  more  difficult  than  the  first, 
if  the  first  question  had  been  answered  negatively.  The 
two  questions  have  different  objects ;  the  first  refers  to  the 
existence  of  God,  the  second  to  his  attributes ;  reason  can 
discover  the  one,  but  it  falls  infinitely  short  in  discovering 
the  whole  of  the  other. 

I  recollect  not  a  single  passage  in  all  the  writings  as- 
cribed to  the  men  called  apostles,  that  convey  any  idea  of 
what  God  is.  Those  writings  are  chiefly  controversial ;  and 
the  subject  they  dwell  upon,  that  of  a  man  dying  in  agony 
co  a  cross,  i»  bolter  raited  to  the  gloomy  genins  of  a  monk 


28  THE   AGE  OF  SEASON.  [PABT  I. 

In  a  cell,  by  whom  it  is  not  impossible  they  were  written, 
than  to  any  man  breathing  the  open  air  of  the  Creation. 
The  only  passage  that  occurs  to  me,  that  has  any  reference 
to  the  works  of  God,  by  which  only  his  power  and  wisdom 
can  be  known,  is  related  to  have  been  spoken  by  Jesus 
Christ,  as  a  remedy  against  distrustful  care.  "  Behold  the 
lilies  of  the  field,  they  toil  not,  neither  do  they  spin."  This, 
however,  is  far  inferior  to  the  allusions  in  Job  and  in  the 
19th  Psalm ;  but  it  is  similar  in  idea,  and  the  modesty  of 
the  imagery  is  correspondent  to  the  modesty  of  the  man. 

As  to  the  Christian  system  of  faith,  it  appears  to  me  as  a 
species  of  atheism — a  sort  of  religious  denial  of  God.  It 
professes  to  believe  in  a  man  rather  than  in  God.  It  is  a 
compound  made  up  chiefly  of  manism  with  but  little  deism, 
and  is  as  near  to  atheism  as  twilight  is  to  darkness.  It  in- 
troduces between  man  and  his  Maker  an  opaque  body, 
which  it  calls  a  lledeemer,  as  the  moon  introduces  her 
opaque  self  between  the  earth  and  the  sun,  and  it  produces 
by  this  means  a  religious  or  an  irreligious  eclipse  of  light. 
It  has  put  the  whole  orbit  of  reason  into  shade. 

The  effect  of  this  obscurity  has  been  that  of  turning 
every  thing  upside  down,  and  representing  it  in  reverse ; 
and  among  the  revolutions  it  has  thus  magically  produced,, 
it  has  made  a  revolution  in  theology. 

That  which  is  now  called  natural  philosophy,  embracing 
the  whole  circle  of  science,  of  which  astronomy  occupies 
the  chief  place,  is  the  study  of  the  works  of  God,  and  of  the 
power  and  wisdom  of  Grod  in  his  works,  and  is  the  true 
theology. 

As  to  the  theology  that  is  now  studied  in  its  place,  it  is 
the  study  of  human  opinions  and  of  human  fancies  concern- 
ing  God.  It  is  not  the  study  of  God  himself  in  the  works 
that  he  has  made,  but  in  the  works  or  writings  that  man 
has  made ;  and  it  is  not  among  the  least  of  the  mischiefs 
that  the  Christian  system  has  done  to  the  world,  that  it  haa 
abandoned  the  original  and  beautiful  system  of  theology, 
like  a  beautiful  innocent,  to  distress  and  reproach,  to  make 
room  for  the  hag  of  superstition. 

The  Book  of  Job  and  the  19th  Psalm,  which  even  the 
Church  admits  to  be  more  ancient  than  the  chronological 
order  in  which  they  stand  in  the  book  called  the  Bible,  are 
theological  orations  conformable  to  the  original  system  of 
theology.  The  internal  evidence  of  those  orations  provef 
to  o  demonstration  that  the  study  and  contemplation  of  th» 


PAJTT  I.j  THE    AGE   OF   KEA8ON.  39 

works  of  creation,  and  of  the  power  and  wisdom  of  God,  re- 
vealed and  manifested  in  those  works,  made  a  great  part  of 
the  religious  devotion  of  the  times  in  which  they  were  writ- 
ten ;  and  it  was  this  devotional  study  and  contemplation 
that  led  to  the  discovery  of  the  principles  upon  which,  what 
are  now  called  sciences,  are  established ;  and  it  is  to  the 
discovery  of  these  principles  that  almost  all  the  arts  that 
contribute  to  the  convenience  of  human  life,  owe  their 
existence.  Every  principal  art  has  some  science  for  its 
parent,  though  me  person  who  mechanically  performs  the 
work  does  not  always,  and  but  very  seldom,  perceive  the 
connection. 

It  is  a  fraud  of  the  Christian  system  to  call  the  sciences 
human  invention  /  it  is  only  the  application  of  them  that 
is  human.  Every  science  has  for  its  basis  a  system  of 
principles  as  fixed  and  unalterable  as  those  by  which 
the  universe  is  regulated  and  governed.  Man  cannot 
make  principles,  he  can  only  discover  them. 

For  example — every  person  who  looks  at  an  almanac 
sees  an  account  when  an  eclipse  will  take  place,  and  he 
sees  also  that  it  never  fails  to  take  place  according  to 
the  account  there  given.  This  shows  that  man  is  ac- 
quainted with  the  laws  by  which  the  heavenly  bodies 
move.  But  it  would  be  something  worse  than  igno- 
rance, were  any  Church  on  earth  to  say  that  those  laws 
are  a  human  invention.  It  would  also  be  ignorance,  or 
something  worse,  to  say  that  the  scientific  principles,  by 
the  aid  of  which  man  is  enabled  to  calculate  and  foreknow 
when  an  eclipse  will  take  place,  are  a  human  invention. 
Man  cannot  invent  a  thing  that  is  eternal  and  immutable  ; 
and  the  scientific  principles  he  employs  for  this  purpose 
must,  and  are,  of  necessity,  as  eternal  and  immutable  as 
the  laws  by  which  the  heavenly  bodies  move,  or  they 
could  not  be  used  as  they  are  to  ascertain  the  time  when, 
and  the  manner  how,  an  eclipse  will  take  place. 

The  scientific  principles  that  man  employs  to  obtain  the 
foreknowledge  of  an  eclipse,  or  of  any  thing  else,  relating 
to  the  motion  of  the  heavenly  bodies,  are  contained  chiefly 
in  that  part  of  science  which  is  called  trigonometry,  or  the 
properties  of  a  triangle,  which,  when  applied  to  the  study 
of  the  heavenly  bodies,  is  called  astronomy  ;  when  applied 
to  direct  the  course  of  a  ship  on  the  ocean,  it  is  called  navi- 
gation ;  when  applied  to  the  construction  of  figures  drawn 
by  rule  and  compass,  it  is  called  geometry  ;  wnen  applied 


80  THE   AGE   OF   EEA8ON.  [PABT  L 

to  the  construction  of  plans  of  edifices,  it  is  called  archi- 
tecture ;  when  applied  to  the  measurement  of  any  portion 
of  the  surface  of  the  earth,  it  is  called  land-surveying.  In 
fine,  it  is  the  soul  of  science  ;  it  is  an  eternal  truth ;  it  con- 
tains the  mathematical  demonstration  of  which  man  speaks, 
and  the  extent  of  its  uses  is  unknown. 

It  may  be  said  that  man  can  make  or  draw  a  triangle, 
and  therefore  a  triangle  is  an  human  invention. 

But  the  triangle,  when  drawn,  is  no  other  than  the 
image  of  the  principle ;  it  is  a  delineation  to  the  eye,  and 
from  thence  to  the  mind,  of  a  principle  that  would  other- 
wise be  imperceptible.  The  triangle  does  not  make  the 
principle,  any  more  than  a  candle  taken  into  a  room  that 
was  dark,  makes  the  chairs  and  tables  that  before  were  in- 
visible. All  the  properties  of  a  triangle  exist  independ- 
ently of  the  figure,  and  existed  before  any  triangle  was 
drawn  or  thought  of  by  man.  Man  had  no  more  to  do  in 
the  formation  of  those  properties  or  principles,  than  he  had 
to  do  in  making  the  laws  by  which  the  heavenly  bodies 
move  ;  and  therefore  the  one  must  have  the  same  Divine 
origin  as  the  other. 

In  the  same  manner  as,  it  may  be  said,  that  man  can 
make  a  triangle,  so  also,  may  it  be  said,  he  can  make  the 
mechanical  instrument  called  a  lever ;  but  the  principle, 
by  which  the  lever  acts,  is  a  thing  distinct  from  the  instru- 
ment, and  would  exist  if  the  instrument  did  not ;  it  attaches 
itself  to  the  instrument  after  it  is  made ;  the  instrument, 
therefore,  can  act  no  otherwise  than  it  does  act ;  neither  can 
all  the  efforts  of  human  invention  make  it  act  otherwise — 
that  which,  in  all  such  cases,  man  calls  the  effect,  is  no  other 
than  the  principle  itself  rendered  perceptible  to  the  senses. 

Since,  then,  man  cannot  make  principles,  from  whence 
did  he  gain  a  knowledge  of  them,  so  as  to  be  able  to  apply 
them,  not  only  to  things  on  earth,  but  to  ascertain  the  mo- 
tion of  bodies  so  immensely  distant  from  him  as  all  the 
heavenly  bodies  are  ?  From  whence,  I  ask,  could  he  gain 
that  knowledge,  but  from  the  study  of  the  true  theology  ? 

It  is  the  structure  of  the  universe  that  has  taught  this 
knowledge  to  man.  That  structure  is  an  ever-existing  ex- 
hibition of  every  principle  upon  which  every  part  of  ma- 
thematical science  is  founded.  The  offspring  of  this  science 
is  mechanics  ;  for  mechanics  is  no  other  than  the  principles 
of  science  applied  practically.  The  man  who  proportions 
the  several  parts  of  a  mill,  uses  the  same  scientific  priuci- 


PAST  I.]  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  81 

pies,  as  if  he  had  the  power  of  constructing  an  universe; 
but  as,  he  cannot  give  to  matter  that  invisible  agency,  by 
which  all  the  component  parts  of  the  immense  machine  of 
the  universe  have  influence  upon  each  other,  and  act  in 
motional  unison  together,  without  any  apparent  contact, 
and  to  which  man  has  given  the  name  of  attraction,  gravi- 
tation, and  repulsion,  he  supplies  the  place  of  that  agency 
by  the  humble  imitation  of  teeth  and  cogs.  All  the  parts 
of  man's  microcosm  must  visibly  touch  :  out  could  he  gain 
a  knowledge  of  that  agency,  so  as  to  be  able  to  apply  it  in 
practice,  we  might  then  say  that  another  canonical  look  of 
the  Word  of  God  had  been  discovered. 

If  man  could  alter  the  properties  of  the  lever,  so  also 
could  he  alter  the  properties  of  the  triangle;  for  a  lever 
(taking  that  sort  of  lever  which  is  called  a  steel-yard,  for 
the  sake  of  explanation)  forms,  when  in  motion,  a  triangle 
The  line  it  descends  from,  (one  point  of  that  line  being  in 
the  iulcrum,)  the  line  it  descends  to,  and  the  cord  of  the 
arc,  which  the  end  of  the  lever  describes  in  the  air,  are  the 
three  sides  of  a  triangle.  The  other  arm  of  the  lever  de- 
scribes also  a  triangle ;  and  the  corresponding  sides  of  those 
two  triangles,  calculated  scientifically,  or  measured  geome- 
trically :  and  also  the  sines,  tangents,  and  secants  generated 
from  the  angles,  and  geometrically  measured,  nave  the 
same  proportions  to  each  other,  as  the  different  weights 
have  that  will  balance  each  other  on  the  lever,  leaving  the 
weight  of  the  lever  out  of  the  case. 

It  may  also  be  said,  that  man  can  make  a  wheel  and 
axis ;  that  he  can  put  wheels  of  different  magnitudes  toge- 
ther, and  produce  a  mill.  Still  the  case  comes  back  to  the 
same  poinf,  which  is,  that  he  did  not  make  the  principle 
that  gives  the  wheels  those  powers.  That  principle  is  as 
unalterable  as  in  the  former  case,  or  rather  it  is  the  same 
principle  under  a  different  appearance  to  the  eye. 

The  power  that  two  wheels  of  different  magnitudes  have 
upon  each  other,  is  in  the  same  proportion  as  if  the  semi- 
diameter  of  the  two  wheels  were  joined  together  and  made 
into  that  kind  of  lever  I  have  described,  suspended  at  the 
part  where  the  semi-diameters  join  ;  for  the  two  wheels, 
scientifically  considered,  are  no  other  than  the  two  circles 
generated  by  the  motion  of  the  compound  lever. 

It  is  from  the  study  of  the  true  theology  that  all  our 
knowledge  of  science  is  derived,  and  it  is  from  that  knowl- 
edge that  all  the  arts  ha^e  originated. 


82  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  [PAKT  L 

The  Almighty  Lecturer,  by  displaying  t_e  principles  of 
science  in  the  structure  of  the  universe,  has  invited  man  to 
study  and  to  imitation.  It  is  as  if  He  had  said  to  the  in- 
habitants of  this  globe,  that  we  call  ours,  "I  have  made  an 
earth  for  man  to  dwell  upon,  ai-d  I  have  rendered  the  starry 
heavens  visible,  to  teach  him  science  and  the  arts.  He  can 
now  provide  for  his  own  comfort,  AND  LEARN  FROM  MY  MUNI- 
FICENCE TO  ALL,  TO  BE  KIND  TO  EACH  OTHER." 

Of  what  use  is  it,  unless  it  be  to  teach  man  something, 
that  his  eye  is  endowed  with  the  power  of  beholding,  to  an 
incomprehensible  distance,  an  immensity  of  worlds  revolv- 
ing in  the  ocean  of  space  ?  Or  of  what  use  is  it  that  this 
immensity  of  worlds  is  visible  to  man  ?  What  has  man  to 
do  with  the  Pleiades,  with  Orion,  with  Sirius,  with  the  star 
he  calls  the  north  star,  with  the  moving  orbs  he  has  named 
Saturn,  Jupiter,  Mars,  Yenus,  and  Mercury,  if  no  uses  are 
to  follow  from  their  being  visible  ?  A  less  power  of  vision 
would  have  been  sufficient  for  man,  if  the  immensity  he 
now  possesses  were  given  only  to  waste  itself,  as  it  were,  on 
an  immense  desert  of  space  glittering  with  shows. 

It  is  only  by  contemplating  what  he  calls  the  starry 
heavens,  as  the  book  and  school  of  science,  that  he  discovers 
any  use  in  their  being  visible  to  him,  or  any  advantage  re- 
sulting from  his  immensity  of  vision.  But  when  he  con- 
templates the  subject  in  this  light,  he  sees  an  additional 
motive  for  saying,  that  nothing  was  made  in  vain  •  for  in 
vain  would  be  this  power  of  vision  if  it  taught  man  nothing. 

As  the  Christian  system  of  faith  has  made  a  revolution 
m  theology,  so  also  has  it  made  a  revolution  in  the  state  of 
learning.  That  which  is  now  called  learning,  was  not 
learning,  originally.  Learning  does  not  consist,  as  the 
schools  now  make  it  consist,  in  the  knowledge  of  lan- 
guages, but  in  the  knowledge  of  things  to  which  language 
gives  names. 

The  Greeks  were  a  learned  people,  but  learning  with 
them  did  not  consist  in  speaking  Greek,  any  more  than  in 
a  Roman's  speaking  Latin,  or  a  Frenchman's  speaking 
French,  or  an  Englishman's  speaking  English.  From 
what  we  know  of  the  Greeks,  it  does  not  apj  ear  that  they 
knew  or  studied  any  language  but  their  own,  and  this  was 
one  csuse  of  their  becoming  so  learned ;  it  afforded  them 
more  time  to  apply  themselves  to  better  studies.  The 
gchools  of  the  Greeks  were  schools  of  science  and  philoso- 
phy, and  not  of  languages  ;  and  it  is  in  the  knowledge  of 


PART  I.  THE    AQE    OF   REA8OW.  &£ 

the  things  that  science  and  philosophy  teach,  that  learning 
consists. 

Almost  all  the  scientific  learning  that  now  exists,  came 
to  us  from  the  Greeks,  or  the  people  who  spoke  the  Greek 
language.  It,  therefore,  became  necessary  for  the  people 
of  other  nations,  who  spoke  a  different  language,  that  some 
among  them  should  learn  the  Greek  language,  in  order 
that  the  learning  the  Greeks  had,  might  be  made  known  in 
those  nations,  by  translating  the  Greek  books  of  science 
and  philosophy  into  the  mother  tongue  of  each  nation. 

Tne  study,  therefore,  of  the  Greek  language  (and  in  the 
same  manner  for  the  Latin)  was  no  other  than  the  drudgery 
business  of  a  linguist ;  and  the  language  thus  obtained,  was 
no  other  than  the  means,  as  it  were  the  tools,  employed  to 
obtain  the  learning  the  Greeks  had.  It  made  no  part  of 
the  learning  itself;  and  was  so  distinct  from  it,  as  to  make 
it  exceedingly  probable  that  the  persons  who  had  studied 
Greek  sufficiently  to  translate  those  works,  such,  for  in 
stance,  as  Euclid  s  Elements,  did  not  understand  any  of  the 
learning  the  works  contained. 

As  there  is  now  nothing  new  to  be  learned  from  the 
dead  languages,  all  the  useful  books  being  already  trans- 
lated, the  languages  are  become  useless,  and  the  time  ex- 
pended in  teaching  and  learning  them  is  wasted.  So  far  as 
the  study  of  languages  may  contribute  to  the  progress  and 
communication  of  knowledge,  (for  it  has  nothing  to  do  with 
the  creation  of  knowledge,)  it  is  only  in  the  living  lan- 
guages that  new  knowledge  is  to  be  found ;  and  certain  it 
is,  that,  in  general,  a  youth  will  learn  more  of  a  living  lan- 
guage in  one  year,  than  of  a  dead  language  in  seven  ;  and 
it  is  but  seldom  that  the  teacher  knows  much  of  it  himself. 
The  difficulty  of  learning  the  dead  languages  does  not  arise 
from  any  superior  abstruseness  in  the  languages  themselves, 
but  in  their  being  dead,  and  the  pronunciation  entirely  lost. 
It  would  be  the  same  thing  with  any  other  language  when 
it  becomes  dead.  The  best  Greek  linguist  that  now  exists, 
does  not  understand  Greek  so  well  as  a  Grecian  ploughman 
did,  or  a  Grecian  milkmaid :  and  the  same  for  the  Latin, 
compared  with  a  ploughman  or  milkmaid  of  the  Romans ; 
it  would  therefore  be  advantageous  to  the  state  of  learning 
to  abolish  the  studv  of  the  dead  languages,  and  to  make 
learning  consist,  as  ft  originally  did,  in  scientific  knowledge. 

The  apology  that  is  sometimes  made  for  continuing  to 
teach  the  dead  languages  is,  that  they  are  taught  at  a  time, 
8 


84  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  [PART  l 

when  a  child  is  not  capable  of  exerting  any  othei  mentai 
faculty  than  that  of  memory ;  but  that  is  altogether  errone- 
ous. The  human  mind  has  a  natural  disposition  t;>  scien- 
tific knowledge,  and  to  the  things  connected  with  it.  The 
first  and  favorite  amusement  of  a  child,  even  before  it  be 
gins  to  play,  is  that  of  imitating  the  works  of  man.  It 
builds  houses  with  cards  or  sticks ;  it  navigates  the  little 
ocean  of  a  bowl  of  water  .with  a  paper  boat,  or  dams  the 
stream  of  a  gutter,  and  contrives  something  which  it  calls 
a  mill ;  and  it  interests  itself  in  the  fate  of  its  works  with  a 
care  that  resembles  affection.  It  afterwards  goes  to  school, 
where  its  genius  is  killed  by  the  barren  study  of  a  dead 
language,  and  the  philosopher  is  lost  in  the  linguist. 

But  the  apology  that  is  now  made  for  continuing  to 
teach  the  dead  languages,  could  not  be  the  cause,  at  first, 
of  cutting  down  learning  to  the  narrow  and  humble  sphere 
of  linguistry ;  the  cause,  therefore,  must  be  sought  for  else- 
where. In  all  researches  of  this  kind,  the  best  evidence 
that  can  be  produced,  is  the  internal  evidence  the  thing 
carries  with  itself,  and  the  evidence  of  circumstances  that 
unites  with  it ;  both  of  which,  in  this  case,  are  not  difficult 
to  be  discovered. 

Putting  then  aside,  as  a  matter  of  distinct  consideration, 
the  outrage  offered  to  the  moral  justice  of  God,  by  suppos- 
ing him  to  make  the  innocent  suffer  for  the  guilty,  and  also 
the  loose  morality  and  low  contrivance  of  supposing  him  to 
change  himself  into  the  shape  of  a  man,  in  order  to  make 
an  excuse  to  himself  for  not  executing*  his  supposed  sentence 
upon  Adam ;  putting,  I  say,  those  things  aside  as  matter 
of  distinct  consideration,  it  is  certain  that  what  is  called  the 
Christian  system  of  faith,  including  in  it  the  whimsical  ac- 
count of  the  creation — the  strange  story  of  Eve — the  snake 
and  the  apple — the  ambiguous  idea  of  a  man-god — the  cor- 
poreal idea  of  the  death  of  a  god — the  mythological  idea  of 
a  family  of  gods,  and  the  Christian  system  of  arithmetic, 
that  three  are  one,  and  one  is  three,  are  all  irreconcilable, 
not  only  to  the  divine  gift  of  reason,  that  God  hath  given 
to  man,  but  to  the  knowledge  that  man  gains  of  the  power 
and  wisdom  «of  God,  by  the  aid  of  the  sciences,  and  by 
studying  the  structure  of  the  universe  that  God  has  made. 

The  setters-up,  therefore,  and  the  advocates  of  the  Chris- 
tian system  of  faith,  could  not  but  foresee  that  the  continu- 
ally progressive  knowledge  that  man  would  gain,  by  the 
aid  of  science,  of  the  power  and  wisdom  of  God,  manifested 


PART  I.J  THE    AGE   OF   SEASON.  85 

n  the  structure  of  the  universe,  and  in  all  the  works  of 
Creation,  would  militate  against,  and  call  into  question,  the 
truth  of  their  system  of  faith  ;  and  therefore  it  became  ne- 
cessary to  their  purpose  to  cut  learning  down  to  a  size  less 
dangerous  to  their  project,  and  this  they  effected  by  re 
striding  the  idea  of  learning  to  the  dead  study  of  dead 
languages. 

They  not  only  rejected  the  study  of  science  out  of  the 
Christian  schools,  but  they  persecuted  it ;  and  it  is  only 
within  about  the  last  two  centuries  that  the  study  has  been 
revived.  So  late  as  1610,  Galileo,  a  Florentine,  discovered 
and  introduced  the  use  of  telescopes,  and  by  applying  them 
to  observe  the  motions  and  appearance  of  the  heavenly 
bodies,  afforded  additional  means  for  ascertaining  the  true 
structure  of  the  universe.  Instead  of  being  esteemed  for 
those  discoveries,  he  was  sentenced  to  renounce  them,  or 
the  opinions  resulting  from  them,  as  a  damnable  heresy. 
And,  prior  to  that  time,  Vigilius  was  condemned  to  be 
burned  for  asserting  the  antipodes,  or  in  other  words,  that 
the  earth  was  a  globe,  and  habitable  in  every  part  where 
there  was  land ;  yet  the  truth  of  this  is  now  too  well  known 
even  to  be  told. 

If  the  belief  of  errors  not  morally  bad  did  no  mischief, 
it  would  make  no  part  of  the  moral  duty  of  man  to  oppose 
and  remove  them.  There  was  no  moral  ill  in  believing  the 
earth  was  flat  like  a  trencher,  any  more  than  there  was 
moral  virtue  in  believing  that  it  was  round  like  a  globe ; 
neither  was  there  any  moral  ill  in  believing  that  the  Creator 
made  no  other  world  than  this,  any  more  than  there  was 
moral  virtue  in  believing  that  he  made  millions,  and  that 
the  infinity  of  space  is  filled  with  worlds.  But  when  a  sys- 
tem of  religion  is  made  to  grow  out  of  a  supposed  system 
of  creation  that  is  not  true,  and  to  unite  itself  therewith  in 
a  manner  almost  inseparable  therefrom,  the  case  assumes 
an  entirely  different  ground.  It  is  then  that  errors,  not 
morally  bad,  become  fraught  with  the  same  mischiefs  as  if 
they  were.  It  is  then  that  the  truth,  though  otherwise  indif- 
ferent itself,  becomes  an  essential,  by  becoming  the  criterion, 
that  either  confirms  by  corresponding  evidence,  or  denies 
by  contradictory  evidence,  the  reality  of  the  religion  itself. 
In  this  view  of  the  case,  it  is  the  moral  duty  of  man  to  ob- 
tain every  possible  evidence  that  the  structure  of  the 
heavens,  or  any  other  part  of  creation  affords,  with  respect 
to  systems  of  religion.  But  this,  the  supporters  or  partizana 


*6  THE    AGE   OF   REASON.  [PAST  L 

or  the  Christian  system,  as  if  dreading  the  result,  incessantly 
opposed,  and  not  only  rejected  the  sciences,  but  persecuted 
the  professors.  Had  Newton  or  Descartes  lived  three  or 
four  hundred  years  ago,  and  pursued  their  studies  as  they 
did,  it  is  most  probable  they  would  not  have  lived  to  finish 
them ;  and  had  Franklin  drawn  lightning  from  the  clouds 
at  the  same  time,  it  would  have  been  at  the  hazard  of  ex- 
piring for  it  in  flames. 

Later  times  have  laid  all  the  blame  upon  the  Goths  and 
Vandals;  but,  however  unwilling  the  partizans  of  the 
Christian  system  may  be  to  believe  or  to  acknowledge  it, 
it  is  nevertheless  true,  that  the  age  of  ignorance  commenced 
with  the  Christian  system.  There  was  more  knowledge  in 
the  world  before  that  period,  than  for  many  centuries  after- 
wards ;  and  as  to  religious  knowledge,  the  Christian  system, 
as  already  said,  was  only  another  species  of  mythology; 
and  the  mythology  to  which  it  succeeded,  was  a  corruption 
of  an  ancient  system  of  theism.* 

It  is  owing  to  this  long  interregnum  of  science,  and  to 
no  other  cause,  that  we  have  now  to  look  through  a  vast 
chasm  of  many  hundred  years  to  the  respectable  characters 
we  call  the  ancients.  Had  the  progression  of  knowledge 
gone  on  proportionably  with  the  stock  that  before  existed, 
that  chasm  would  have  been  filled  up  with  characters  rising 
superior  in  knowledge  to  each  other;  and  those  ancients 

*  It  is  impossible  for  us  now  to  know  at  what  time  the  heathen  my 
thology  began  ;  but  it  is  certain,  from  the  internal  evidence  that  it  carries, 
that  it  did  not  begin  in  the  same  state  or  condition  in  which  it  ended.  All 
the  gods  of  that  mythology,  except  Saturn,  were  of  modern  invention.  Th« 
supposed  reign  of  Saturn  was  prior  to  that  which  is  called  the  heathen  my- 
thology, and  was  so  far  a  species  of  theism,  that  it  admitted  the  belief  of 
only  one  God.  Saturn  is  supposed  to  have  abdicated  the  government  in 
favor  of  his  three  sons  and  one  daughter,  Jupiter,  Pluto,  Neptune,  and  Juno ; 
after  this,  thousands  of  other  gods  and  demi-gods  were  imaginarily  created, 
and  the  calendar  of  gods  increased  as  fast  as  the  calendar  of  saints,  and  the 
calendars  of  courts  have  increased  since. 

All  the  corruptions  that  have  taken  place,  in  theology  and  in  religion, 
have  been  produced  by  admitting  of  what  man  calls  revealed  religion.  Th« 
Mythologists  pretended  to  more  revealed  religion  than  the  Christians  do. 
They  had  their  oracles  and  their  priests,  who  were  supposed  to  receive  and 
deliver  the  word  of  God  verbally,  on  almost  all  occasions. 

Since  then  all  corruptions  down  from  Molock  to  modern  predestinarian- 
ism,  and  the  human  sacrifices  of  the  heathens  to  the  Christian  sacrifice  of. 
the  Creator,  have  been  produced  by  admitting  of  what  is  called  revealed 
religion;  the  most  effectual  means  to  prevent  all  such  evils  and  impositions 
is,  not  to  admit  of  any  other  revelation  than  that  which  is  manifested  in  th« 
book  of  creation,  and  to  contemplate  the  creation  as  the  only  true  and  r«al 
work  of  God  that  ever  did,  or  ever  will  exist ;  and  that  every  thing  «!MI 
tmllad  the  wore1  of  God,  is  fable  and  imposition. 


PAST  I.]  THE   AGE   OF   EEAJSOM  87 

we  now  so  much  admire,  would  have  appeared  respectably 
in  the  back  ground  of  the  scene.  But  the  Christian  system 
laid  all  waste ;  and  if  we  take  our  stand  about  the  begin- 
ning of  the  sixteenth  century,  we  look  back  through  that 
long  chasm,  to  the  times  of  the  ancients,  as  over  a  vast  sandy 
desert,  in  which  not  a  shrub  appears  to  intercept  the  vision 
to  the  fertile  hills  beyond. 

It  is  an  inconsistency  scarcely  possible  to  be  credited, 
that  any  thing  should  exist,  under  the  name  of  a  religion, 
that  held  it  to  be  irreligious  to  study  and  contemplate  the 
structure  of  the  universe  that  God  had  made.  But  the  fact 
is  too  well  established  to  be  denied.  The  event  that  served 
more  than  any  other  to  break  the  first  link  in  this  long 
chain  of  despotic  ignorance,  is  that  known  by  the  name  of 
the  Reformation  by  Luther.  From  that  time,  though  it 
does  not  appear  to  have  made  any  part  of  the  intention  of 
Luther,  or  of  those  who  are  called  reformers,  the  sciences 
began  to  revive,  and  liberality,  their  natural  associate, 
began  to  appear.  This  was  the  only  public  good  the 
Reformation  did  ;  for,  with  respect  to  religious  good,  it 
might  as  well  not  have  taken  place.  The  mythology  still 
continued  the  same ;  and  a  multiplicity  of  National  JPopea 
grew  out  of  the  downfall  of  the  Pope  of  Christendom. 

Having  thus  shown  from  the  internal  evidence  of  things, 
the  cause  that  produced  a  change  in  the  state  of  learning, 
and  the  motive  for  substituting  the  study  of  dead  languages, 
in  the  place  of  the  sciences,  I  proceed,  in  addition  to  the 
several  observations,  already  made  in  the  former  part  of 
this  work,  to  compare,  or  rather  to  confront  the  evidence 
that  the  structure  of  the  universe  affords,  with  the  Christian 
system  of  religion ;  but,  as  I  cannot  begin  this  part  better 
than  by  referring  to  the  ideas  that  occurred  to  me  at  an 
early  part  of  life,  and  which  I  doubt  not  have  occurred  in 
some  degree  to  almost  every  other  person  at  one  time  or 
other,  I  shall  state  what  those  ideas  were,  and  add  thereto 
euch  other  matter  as  shall  arise  out  of  the  subject,  giving  to 
the  whole,  by  way  of  preface,  a  short  introduction. 

My  father  being  of  the  Quaker  profession,  it  was  my 
good  fortune  to  have  an  exceeding  good  moral  education, 
and  a  tolerable  stock  of  useful  learning.  Though  I  went  to 
the  grammar  school,*  I  did  not  learn  Latin,  not  only 
because  I  had  no  inclination  to  learn  languages,  bu, 

*  The  same  school,  Thetford  in  Norfolk,  that  the  present  Counsellor  Mi* 
fay  went  to,  and  under  the  tame  roaster. 


38  THE   AGE   OF   BEASON.  [PAST  L 

because  of  the  objection  the  Quakers  have  against  the 
.books  in  which  the  language  is  taught.  But  this  did  no* 
prevent  me  from  being  acquainted  with  the  subjects  of  all 
the  Latin  books  used  in  the  school. 

The  natural  bent  of  my  mind  was  to  science.  I  had 
some  turn,  and  I  believe  some  talent  for  poetry ;  but  this  I 
rather  repressed  than  encouraged,  as  leading  too  much  into 
the  field  of  imagination.  As  soon  as  I  was  able,  I  pur- 
chased a  pair  of  globes,  and  attended  the  philosophical 
lectures  of  Martin  and  Ferguson,  and  became  afterwards 
acquainted  with  Dr.  Bevis,  of  the  society,  called  the 
Royal  Society,  then  living  in  the  Temple,  and  an  excellent 
astronomer. 

I  had  no  disposition  for  what  is  called  politics.  It  pre- 
sented to  my  mind  no  other  idea  than  is  contained  in  the 
word  Jockeyship.  When,  therefore,  I  turned  my  thoughts 
towards  matters  of  government,  I  had  to  form  a  system  for 
myself,  that  accorded  with  the  moral  and  philosophic  prin- 
ciples in  which  I  had  been  educated.  I  saw,  or  at  least  1 
thought  I  saw,  a  vast  scene  opening  itself  to  the  world  in 
the  affairs  of  America ;  and  it  appeared  to  me,  that  unless 
the  Americans  changed  the  plan  they  were  then  pursuing, 
with  respect  to  the  government  of  England,  and  declared 
themselves  independent,  they  would  not  only  involve  them- 
selves in  a  multiplicity  of  new  difficulties,  but  shut  out  the 
prospect  that  was  then  offering  itself  to  mankind  through 
their  means.  It  was  from  these  motives  that  I  published 
the  work  known  by  the  name  of  "  Common  Sense"  which 
is  the  first  work  I  ever  did  publish ;  and  so  far  as  I  can 
judge  of  myself,  I  believe  I  should  never  have  been  known 
in  the  world  as  an  author,  on  any  subject  whatever,  had  it 
not  been  for  the  affairs  of  America.  I  wrote  "  Common 
Sense"  the  latter  end  of  the  year  1775,  and  published  it  the 
first  of  January,  1776.  Independence  was  declared  the 
fourth  of  July  following. 

Any  person,  who  has  made  observations  on  the  state 
and  progress  of  the  human  mind,  by  observing  his  own, 
cannot  but  have  observed,  that  there  are  two  distinct 
classes  of  what  are  called  Thoughts ;  those  that  we  produce 
in  ourselves  by  reflection  and  the  act  of  thinking,  and  those 
that  bolt  into  the  mind  of  their  own  accord.  I  have  always 
made  it  a  rule  to  treat  those  voluntary  visitors  with  civility, 
taking  care  to  examine,  as  well  I  was  able,  if  they  were 
worth  entertaini  :ig ;  and  it  is  from  them  I  have  acquired 


THE    AGE    OF    REASON.  89 

almost  all  the  knowledge  that  I  have.  As  to  the  learning 
that  any  person  gains  trom  school  education,  it  serves  only 
like  a  small  capital,  to  put  him  in  the  way  of  beginning 
learning  for  himself  afterwards.  Every  person  of  learning 
is  finally  his  own  teacher,  the  reason  of  which  is,  that  prin- 
ciples, being  of  a  distinct  quality  to  circumstances,  cannot 
be  impressed  upon  the  memory ;  their  place  of  mental 
residence  is  the  understanding,  and  they  are  never  so  last- 
ing as  when  they  begin  by  conception.  Thus  much  for  the 
introductory  part. 

From  the  time  I  was  capable  of  conceiving  an  idea,  and 
acting  upon  it  by  reflection,  I  either  doubted  the  truth  of 
the  Christian  system,  or  thought  it  to  be  a  strange  affair ;  1 
scarcely  knew  which  it  was :  but  I  well  remember,  when 
about  seven  or  eight  years  of  age,  hearing  a  sermon  read 
by  a  relation  of  mine,  who  was  a  great  devotee  of  the 
church,  upon  the  subject  of  what  is  called  redemption  by 
the  death  of  the  Son  of  God.  After  the  sermon  was  ended, 
I  went  into  the  garden,  and  as  I  was  going  down  the  garden 
steps  (for  I  perfectly  recollect  the  spot)  I  revolted  at  the 
recollection  of  what  I  had  heard,  and  thought  to  myself 
that  it  was  making  God  Almighty  act  like  a  passionate 
man,  that  killed  his  son,  when  he  could  not  revenge  him 
self  any  other  way ;  and  as  I  was  sure  a  man  would  be 
hanged  that  did  such  a  thing,  I  could  not  see  for  what  pur- 
pose they  preached  such  sermons.  This  was  not  one  of  that 
kind  of  thoughts  that  had  any  thing  in  it  of  childish  levity ; 
it  was  to  me  a  serious  reflection,  arising  from  the  idea 
I  had,  that  God  was  too  good  to  do  such  an  action,  and 
also  too  almighty  to  be  under  any  necessity  of  doing  it. 
I  believe  in  the  same  manner  at  this  moment ;  and  I  more- 
over believe,  that  any  system  of  religion  that  has  any 
thing  in  it  that  shocks  the  mind  of  a  child,  cannot  be  a 
true  system. 

It  seems  as  if  parents  of  the  Christian  profession  were 
ashamed  to  tell  their  children  any  thing  about  the  prin- 
ciples of  their  religion.  They  sometimes  instruct  them  in 
morals,  and  talk  to  them  of  the  goodness  of  what  they  call 
Providence ;  for  the  Christian  mythology  has  five  deities — 
there  is  God  the  Father,  God  the  Son,  God  the  Holy  Ghost, 
the  God  Providence,  and  the  Goddess  Nature.  But  the 
Christian  story  of  God  the  Father  putting  his  son  to  death, 
or  employing  people  to  do  it,  (for  that  is  the  plain  language 
of  the  vtory,)  cannot  be  told  by  a  parent  to  a  child ;  and 


tO  THE   AGE   OF   BEASOJf.  [PABT  L 

to  tell  him  that  it  was  done  to  make  mankind  happier  and 
better,  is  making  the  story  still  worse  ;  as  if  mankind  could 
be  improved  by  the  example  of  murder ;  and  to  tell  him 
that  all  this  is  a  mystery,  is  only  making  an  excuse  for  the 
incredibility  of  it. 

How  different  is  this  to  the  pure  and  simple  profession 
of  Deism !  The  true  Deist  has  but  one  Deity ;  and  his 
religion  consists  in  contemplating  the  power,  wisdom,  and 
benignity  of  the  Deity  in  his  works,  and  in  endeavoring 
to  imitate  him  in  every  thing  moral,  scientifical  and 
mechanical 

The  religion  that  approaches  the  nearest  of  all  others  to 
true  Deism,  in  the  moral  and  benign  part  thereof,  is  thai 
professed  by  the  Quakers :  but  they  have  contracted  them 
selves  too  much,  by  leaving  the  works  of  God  out  of  theii 
system.  Though  I  reverence  their  philanthropy,  I  can  not 
help  smiling  at  the  conceit,  that  if  the  taste  of  a  Quaker 
could  have  been  consulted  at  the  creation,  what  a  silent 
and  drab-colored  creation  it  would  have  been  !  Not  a 
flower  would  have  blossomed  its  gaities,  nor  a  bird  been 
permitted  to  sing. 

Qutting  these  reflections,  I  proceed  to  other  matters. 
After  I  had  made  myself  master  of  the  use  of  the  globes, 
and  of  the  orrery,*  and  conceived  an  idea  of  the  infinity  of 
space,  and  the  eternal  divisibility  of  matter,  and  obtained, 
at  least,  a  general  knowledge  of  what  was  called  natural 
philosophy,  I  began  to  compare,  or,  as  I  have  before  said, 
to  confront  the  eternal  evidence  those  things  afford  with 
the  Christian  system  of  faith. 

Though  it  is  not  a  direct  article  of  the  Christian  system, 
that  this  world  that  we  inhabit,  is  the  whole  of  the  habit- 
able creation,  yet  it  is  so  worked  up  therewith,  from  what 
is  called  the  Mosaic  account  of  the  Creation,  the  story  of 
Eve  and  the  apple,  and  the  counterpart  of  that  story,  the 
death  of  the  Son  of  God,  that  to  believe  otherwise,  that  is, 

*  As  this  book  may  fall  into  the  hands  of  persons  who  do  not  know  what 
an  orrery  is,  it  is  for  their  information  I  add  fllris  note,  as  the  name  gives  no 
idea  of  the  uses  of  the  thing.  The  orrery  has  its  name  from  the  person  who 
invented  it,  It  is  a  machinery  of  clock-work,  representing  the  universe  in 
miniature,  and  in  which  the  revolution  of  the  earth  round  itself  and  round 
the  sun,  the  revolution  of  the  moon  round  the  earth,  the  revolution  of  th« 
planets  round  the  sun,  their  relative  distances  from  the  sun,  as  the  centre  o'f 
the  whole  system,  their  relative  distances  from  each  other,  and  their  dif- 
ferent magnitu  lea,  are  represented  as  they  really  exist  in  whf  t  we  call  tbt 


PAST  I.  J  THE   AQB   OF   REASON.  41 

to  believe  that  God  created  a  plurality  of  worlds,  at  least 
as  numerous  as  what  we  call  stars,  renders  the  Christian 
system  of  faith  at  once  little  and  ridiculous,  and  scatters  iv 
in  the  mind  like  feathers  in  the  air.  The  two  beliefs  can 
not  be  held  together  in  the  same  mind  ;  and  he  who  thinka 
that  he  believes  both,  has  thought  but  little  of  either. 

Though  the  belief  of  a  plurality  of  worlds  was  familiar 
to  the  ancients,  it  is  only  within  the  last  three  centuries 
that  the  extent  and  dimensions  of  this  globe  that  we  inhabit 
have  been  ascertained.  Several  vessels,  following  the  tract 
of  the  ocean,  have  sailed  entirely  round  the  world,  as  a 
man  may  march  in  a  circle,  and  come  round  by  the  con- 
trary side  of  the  circle  to  the  spot  he  set  out  from.  The 
circular  dimensions  of  our  world,  in  the  widest  part,  as  a 
man  would  measure  the  widest  round  of  an  apple,  or  a  ball, 
is  only  twenty-five  thousand  and  twenty  English  miles, 
reckoning  sixty-nine  miles  and  an  half  to  an  equatorial 
degree,  and  may  be  sailed  round  in  the  space  of  about 
three  years.* 

A  world  of  this  extent  may,  at  first  thought,  appear  to 
us  to  be  great ;  but  if  we  compare  it  with  the  immensity 
of  space  in  which  it  is  suspended,  like  a  bubble  or  balloon 
in  the  air,  it  is  infinitely  less,  in  proportion,  than  the 
smallest  grain  of  sand  is  to  the  size  of  the  world,  or  the 
finest  particle  of  dew  to  the  whole  ocean,  and  is  therefore 
but  email ;  and,  as  will  be  hereafter  shown,  is  only  one 
of  a  system  of  worlds,  of  which  the  universal  creation  is 
comoosed. 

It  is  not  difficult  to  gain  some  faint  idea  of  the  immensity 
of  space  in  which  this  and  all  the  other  worlds  are  sus- 
pended, if  we  follow  a  progression  of  ideas.  When  we 
think  of  the  size  or  dimensions  of  a  room,  our  ideas  limit 
themselves  to  the  walls,  and  there  they  stop  ;  but  when  our 
eye,  or  our  imagination  darts  into  space,  that  is,  when  it 
looks  upwards  into  what  we  call  the  open  air,  we  cannot 
conceive  any  walls  or  boundaries  it  can  have ;  and  if  for 
the  sake  of  resting  our  ideas,  we  suppose  a  boundary,  the 
question  immediately  renews  itself,  and  asks,  what  is  be- 
yond that  boundary  ?  and  in  the  same  manner,  what  beyond 
the  next  boundary  ?  and  so  on  till  the  fatigued  imagination 
returns  and  says,  there  is  no  end.  Certainly,  then,  the 

*  Allowing  a  ship  to  sail,  on  an  average,  three  mile*  in  an  boor,  she  would 
•ail  entirely  round  the  world  in  less  than  one  year,  if  she  could  tail  in  a  dir««l 
•ire1 » ;  bat  the  it  obliged  to  foil*  -v  the  course  of  the  ocean. 


£2  THE    AGE   OF   REASON.  [PAST  1 

Creator  was  not  pent  for  room,  when  he  made  this  world 
no  larger  than  it  is ;  and  we  have  to  seek  the  reason  in 
something  else. 

If  we  take  a  survey  of  our  own  world,  or  rather  of  this, 
of  which  the  Creator  has  given  us  the  use,  as  our  portion 
in  the  immense  system  of  Creation,  we  find  every  part  of 
it,  the  earth,  the  waters,  and  the  air  that  surrounds  it,  filled, 
and,  as  it  were,  crowded  with  life,  down  from  the  largest 
animals  that  we  know  of  to  the  smallest  insects  the  naked 
eye  can  behold,  and  from  thence  to  others  still  smaller,  and 
totally  invisible  without  the  assistance  of  the  microscope. 
Every  tree,  every  plant,  every  leaf,  serves  not  only  as  an 
habitation,  but  as  a  world  to  some  numerous  race,  till  ani- 
mal existence  becomes  so  exceedingly  refined,  that  the 
effluvia  of  a  blade  of  grass  would  be  food  for  thousands. 

Since  then  no  part  of  our  earth  is  left  unoccupied,  why 
is  it  to  be  supposed  that  the  immensity  of  space  is  a  naked 
void,  lying  in  eternal  waste  ?  There  is  room  for  millions  of 
worlds  as  large  or  larger  than  ours,  and  each  of  them  mil . 
lions  of  miles  apart  from  each  other 

Having  now  arrived  at  this  point,  if  we  carry  our  ideas 
only  one  thought  further,  we  shall  see,  perhaps,  the  true 
reason,  at  least  a  very  good  reason,  for  our  happiness,  why 
the  Creator,  instead  of  making  one  immense  world,  extend- 
ing over  an  immense  quantity  of  space,  has  preferred  divid- 
ing that  quantity  of  matter  into  several  distinct  and  separate 
worlds,  which  we  call  planets,  of  which  our  earth  is  one. 
But  before  I  explain  my  ideas  upon  this  subject,  it  is 
necessary  (not  for  the  sake  of  those  that  already  know, 
but  for  those  who  do  not)  to  show  what  the  system  of  the 
universe  is. 

That  part  of  the  universe  that  is  called  the  solar  system 
(meaning  the  system  of  worlds  to  which  our  earth  belongs, 
and  of  which  Sol,  or  in  English  language,  the  Sun,  is  the 
centre)  consists,  besides  the  Sun,  of  six  distinct  orbs,  or 
planets,  or  worlds,  besides  the  secondary  bodies,  called  the 
satellites  or  moons,  of  which  our  earth  has  one  that  attends 
her  in  her  annual  revolution  round  the  Sun,  in  like  manner 
as  other  satellites  or  moons,  attend  the  planets  or  worlds  to 
which  they  severally  belong,  as  may  be  seen  by  the  assist 
ance  of  the  telescope. 

The  Sun  is  the  centre,  round  which  those  six  worlds  or 
planets  revolve  at  different  distances  therefrom,  and  in 
ttircles  concentrate  to  each  other.  Each  world  keeps  con- 


PAST  I.]  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  4& 

stantly  in  nearly  the  same  track  round  the  Sun,  and  con- 
tinues, at  the  same  time,  turning  round  itself,  in  nearly  an 
upright  position,  as  a  top  turns  round  itself  when  it  is  spin- 
ning on  the  ground,  and  leans  a  little  sideways. 

It  is  this  leaning  of  the  earth  (23£  degrees)  that  occasions 
summer  and  winter,  and  the  different  length  of  days  and 
nights.  If  the  earth  turned  round  itself  in  a  position  per- 
'  pendicular  to  the  plane  or  level  of  the  circle  it  moves  in 
around  the  Sun,  as  a  top  turns  round  when  it  stands  erect 
on  the  ground,  the  days  and  nights  would  be  always  of 
the  same  length,  twelve  hours  day  and  twelve  hours  night, 
and  the  seasons  would  be  uniformly  the  same  throughout 
the  year. 

Every  time  that  a  planet  (our  earth  for  example)  turns 
round  itself,  it  makes  what  we  call  day  and  night;  and 
every  time  it  goes  entirely  round  the  Sun,  it  makes  what 
we  call  a  year,  consequently  our  world  turns  three  hundred 
and  sixty-five  times  round  itself,  in  going  once  round  the  Sun.* 

The  names  that  the  ancients  gave  to  those  six  worlds, 
and  which  are  still  called  by  the  same  names,  are  Mercury, 
Venus,  this  world  that  we  call  ours,  Mars,  Jupiter,  and 
Saturn.  They  appear  larger  to  the  eye  than  the  stars,  be- 
ing many  million  miles  nearer  to  our  earth  than  any  of  the 
stars  are.  The  planet  Yenus  is  that  which  is  called  the 
-evening  star,  and  sometimes  the  morning  star,  as  she  hap- 
pens to  set  after,  or  rise  before  the  Sun,  which  in  either 
case,  is  never  more  than  three  hours. 

The  Sun,  as  before  said,  being  the  centre,  the  planet,  or 
world,  nearest  the  Sun,  is  Mercury ;  his  distance  from  the 
Sun  is  thirty-four  million  miles,  and  he  moves  round  in  a 
circle  always  at  that  distance  from  the  Sun,  as  a  top  may 
be  supposed  to  spin  round  in  the  track  in  which  a  horse 
goes  in  a  mill.  The  second  world,  is  Yen  us,  she  is  fifty- 
seven  million  miles  distant  from  the  Sun,  and  consequently 
moves  round  in  a  circle  much  greater  than  that  of  Mercury. 
The  third  world  is  that  we  inhabit,  and  which  is  eighty 
eight  million  miles  distant  from  the  Sun,  and  consequently 
moves  round  in  a  circle  greater  than  that  of  Yenus.  The 
fourth  world  is  Mars,  he  is  distant  from  the  Sun  one  hun- 
dred and  thirty-four  million  miles,  and  consequently  moves 

*  Those  who  supposed  that  the  Sun  went  round  the  earth  every  24  hours. 
made  the  same  mistake  in  idea  that  a  cook  would  do  in  fact,  that  should 
nake  the  fire  go  round  the  meat,  instead  of  the  meet  turning  round  iUelf 
toward*  the  fir*. 


44  THE  AGE  OF   REASON.  [PART  t 

round  in  a  circle  greater  than  that  oi  our  earth.  The  fifth 
is  Jupiter,  he  rs  distant  from  the  Sun  five  hundred  and 
fifty-seven  million  miles,  and  consequently  moves  round  in 
a  circle  greater  than  that  of  Mars.  The  sixth  world  is 
Saturn,  he  is  distant  from  the  Sun  seven  hundred  and 
sixty-three  million  miles,  and  consequently  moves  round  in 
a  circle  that  surrounds  the  circles,  or  orbits,  of  all  the  othert 
worlds  or  planets. 

The  space,  therefore,  in  the  air,  or  in  the  immensity  of 
space,  that  our  solar  system  takes  up  for  the  several  worlds 
to  perform  their  revolutions  in  round  the  Sun,  is  of  the 
extent  in  a  straight  line  of  the  whole  diameter  of  the  orbit 
or  circle,  in  which  Saturn  moves  round  the  Sun,  which  be- 
ing double  his  distance  from  the  Sun,  is  fifteen  hundred 
and  twenty-six  million  miles:  and  its  circular  extent  is 
nearly  five  thousand  million ;  and  its  globical  content  is 
almost  three  thousand  five  Ijundred  million  times  three 
thousand  five  hundred  million  square  miles.* 

But  this,  immense  as  it  is,  is  only  one  system  of  worlds. 
Beyond  this,  at  a  vast  distance  into  space,  far  beyond  all 
power  of  calculation,  are  the  stars  called  the  fixed  stars. 
They  are  called  fixed,  because  they  have  no  revolutionary 
motion,  as  the  six  worlds  or  planets  have  that  I  have  been 
describing.  Those  fixed  stars  continue  always  at  the  same 
distance  from  each  other,  and  always  in  the  same  place,  as 
the  Sun  does  in  the  centre  of  our  system.  The  probability, 
therefore,  is,  that  each  of  those  fixed  stars  is  also  a  Sun, 
round  which  another  system  of  worlds  or  planets,  though 
too  remote  for  us  to  discover,  performs  its  revolutions,  as 
our  system  of  worlds  does  round  our  central  Sun. 

By  this  easy  progression  of  ideas,  the  immensity  of  space 

*  If  it  should  be  asked,  how  can  man  know  these  things  ?  I  have  one 
plain  answer  to  give,  which  is,  that  man  knows  how  to  calculate  an  eclipse, 
and  also  how  to  calculate  to  a  minute  of  time  when  the  planet  Venus,  in 
making  her  revolutions  round  the  Sun,  will  come  in  a  straight  line  between 
our  earth  and  the  Sun,  and  will  appear  to  us  about  the  size  of  a  large  pea 
passing  across  the  face  of  the  Sun.  This  happens  but  twice  in  about  an 
hundred  years,  at  the  distance  of  about  eight  years  from  each  other,  and  hat 
happened  twice  in  our  time,  both  of  which  were  foreknown  by  calculation. 
It  can  also  be  known  when  they  will  happen  again  for  a  thousand  years  t« 
come,  or  to  any  other  portion  of  time.  As,  therefore,  man  could  not  be  able 
to  do  these  things  if  he  did  not  understand  the  solar  system,  and  the  manner 
in  which  the  revolutions  of  the  several  planets  or  worlds  are  performed,  the 
fact  of  calculating  an  eclipse,  or  a  transit  of  Venus,  is  a  proof  in  point  that 
the  knowledge  exists ;  and  as  to  a  few  thousand,  or  even  a  few  million 
miles,  more  or  less,  it  makes  scarcely  any  sensible  difference  in  wuh  ira 
menM  distances. 


PART  L]  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  4ft 

mil  appear  to  us  to  he  filled  with  systems  of  worlds ;  and 
that  no  part  of  space  lies  at  waste,  any  more  than  any  part 
of  the  globe  or  earth  and  water  is  left  unoccupied. 

Having  thus  endeavoured  to  convey,  in  a  familiar  and 
easy  manner,  some  idea  of  the  structure  of  the  universe,  1 
return  to  explain  what  I  before  alluded  to,  namely,  the 

freat  benefits  arising  to  man  in  consequence  of  the  Creator 
aving  made  a  plurality  of  worlds,  such  as  our  system  is, 
consisting  of  a  central  Sun  and  six  worlds  besides  satellites, 
in  preference  to  that  of  creating  one  world  only  of  a  vast 
extent. 

It  is  an  idea  I  have  never  lost  sight  of,  that  all  our 
knowledge  of  science  is  derived  from  the  revolutions  (ex- 
hibited to  our  eye  and  from  thence  to  our  understanding) 
which  those  several  planets  or  worlds,  of  which  our  system 
is  composed,  make  in  their  circuit  round  the  Sun. 

Had  then  the  quantity  of  matter  which  these  six  worlds 
contain  been  blended  into  one  solitary  globe,  the  conse- 
quence to  us  would  have  been,  that  either  no  revolutionary 
motion  would  have  existed,  or  not  a  sufficiency  of  it  to  give 
us  the  idea  and  the  knowledge  of  science  we  now  have ; 
and  it  is  from  the  sciences  that  all  the  mechanical  arts  that 
contribute  so  much  to  our  earthly  felicity  and  comfort,  are 
derived. 

As,  therefore,  the  Creator  made  nothing  in  vain,  so  also 
must  it  be  believed  that  He  organized  the  structure  of  the 
universe  in  the  most  advantageous  manner  for  the  benefit 
of  man ;  and  as  we  see,  and  from  experience  feel,  the  bene- 
fits we  derive  from  the  structure  of  the  universe,  formed  as 
it  is,  which  benefits  we  should  not  have  had  the  opportunity 
of  enjoying,  if  the  structure,  so  far  as  relates  to  our  system, 
had  been  a  solitary  globe — we  can  discover  at  least  one 
reason  why  a  plurality  of  worlds  has  been  made,  and  that 
reason  calls  forth  the  devotional  gratitude  of  man,  as  well 
as  his  admiration. 

Put  it  is  not  to  us,  the  inhabitants  of  this  globe,  only, 
that  the  benefits  arising  from  a  plurality  of  worlds  are 
limited.  The  inhabitants  of  each  of  the  worlds  of  which 
our  system  is  composed,  enjcy  the  same  opportunities  of 
knowledge  as  we  do.  They  behold  the  revolutionary  mo- 
tions of  our  earth,  as  we  behold  theirs.  All  the  planets 
revolve  in  sight  of  each  other ;  and,  therefore,  the  same 
universal  school  of  science  presents  itself  to  all. 

Neither  doee  the  knowledge  stop  hero.     Tho  sjstoin  of 


46  THE  AGE  OF  BEASON  |  PAET  i 

worlds  next  to  us  exhibits,  in  its  revolutions,  the  same 
principles  and  school  of  science,  to  the  inhabitants  of  their 
system,  as  our  system  does  to  us,  and  in  like  manner 
throughout  the  immensity  of  space. 

Our  ideas,  not  only  of  the  almightiness  of  the  Creator, 
but  of  his  wisdom  and  his  beneficence,  become  enlarged  in 
proportion  as  we  contemplate  the  extent  and  the  structure 
of  the  universe.  The  solitary  idea  of  a  solitary  world,  roll- 
ing or  at  rest  in  the  immense  ocean  of  space,  gives  place  to 
the  cheeiful  idea  of  a  society  or  worlds,  so  happily  con- 
trived ae  to  administer,  even  by  their  motion,  instruction  to 
man.  "We  see  our  own  earth  filled  with  abundance ;  but 
we  forget  to  consider  how  much  of  that  abundance  is  owing 
to  the  scientific  knowledge  the  vast  machinery  of  the  uni- 
verse has  unfolded. 

But,  in  the  midst  of  those  reflections,  what  are  we  ta 
think  of  the  Christian  system  of  faith,  that  forms  itself  upon 
the  idea  of  only  one  world,  and  that  of  no  greater  extent, 
as  is  before  shown,  than  twenty -five  thousand  miles  ?  An 
extent  which  a  man,  walking  at  the  rate  of  three  miles  an 
hour,  for  twelve  hours  in  the  day,  could  he  keep  on  in  a 
circular  direction,  would  walk  entirely  round  in  less  than 
two  years.  Alas !  what  is  this  to  the  mighty  ocean  of  space, 
and  the  almighty  power  of  the  Creator. 

From  whence  then  could  arise  the  solitary  and  strange 
conceit,  that  the  Almighty,  who  had  millions  of  worlds 
equally  dependent  on  his  protection,  should  quit  the  care 
of  all  the  rest,  and  come  to  die  in  our  world,  because,  they 
say,  one  man  and  one  woman  had  eaten  an  apple !  And, 
on  the  other  hand,  are  we  to  suppose  that  every  world  in 
the  boundless  creation,  had  an  Eve,  an  apple,  a  serpent, 
and  a  redeemer  ?  In  this  case,  the  person  who  is  irrever- 
ently called  the  Son  of  God,  and  sometimes  God  himself, 
would  have  nothing  else  to  do  than  to  travel  from  world 
to  world,  in  an  endless  succession  of  death,  with  scarcely  a 
momentary  interval  of  life. 

It  has  been  by  rejecting  the  evidence,  that  the  word  or 
works  of  God  in  the  creation  afford  to  our  senses,  and  the 
action  of  our  reason  upon  that  evidence,  that  so  many  wild 
and  whimsical  systems  of  faith,  and  of  religion,  have  been 
fabricated  and  set  up.  There  may  be  many  systems  of  re- 
ligion, that  so  far  from  being  morally  bad,  are  in  many 
respects  morally  good :  but  there  can  be  but  ONE  that  is 
true ;  and  that  one  necessarily  must,  as  it  ever  will,  be  in 


PART  I.]  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  4T 

all  things  consistent  with  the  ever  existing  word  of  God 
that  we  behold  in  his  works.  But  such  is  me  strange  con 
struction  of  the  Christian  system  of  faith,  that  every  evi- 
dence the  Heavens  afford  to  man,  either  directly  contradicts 
it,  or  renders  it  absurd. 

.  It  is  possible  to  believe,  and  I  always  feel  pleasure  in 
encouraging  myself  to  believe  it,  that  there  have  been  men 
in  the  world,  who  persuade  themselves  that,  what  is  called 
a  pious  fraud,  might,  at  least  under  particular  circumstan- 
ces, be  productive  of  some  good.  But  the  fraud  being  once 
established,  could  not  afterwards  be  explained ;  for  it  is  with 
a  pious  fraud  as  with  a  bad  action,  it  begets  a  calamitous 
necessity  of  going  on. 

The  persons  who  first  preached  the  Christian  system  of 
faith,  and  in  some  measure  combined  it  with  the  morality 
preached  by  Jesus  Christ,  might  persuade  themselves  that 
it  was  better  than  the  heathen  mythology  that .  then  pre- 
vailed. From  the  first  preachers  the  fraud  went  on  to  the 
second,  and  to  the  third,  till  the  idea  of  its  being  a  pious 
fraud  became  lost  in  the  belief  of  its  being  true ;  and  that 
belief  became  again  encouraged  by  the  interests  of  those 
who  made  a  livelihood  by  preaching  it. 

But  though  such  a  belief  might,  by  such  means,  be  ren- 
dered almost  general  among  the  laity,  it  is  next  to  impossi- 
ble to  account  for  the  continual  persecution  carried  on  by 
the  church,  for  several  hundred  years,  against  the  sciences, 
and  against  the  professors  of  sciences,  if  the  church  had  not 
some  record  or  tradition,  that  it  was  originally  no  other 
than  a  pious  fraud,  or  did  not  foresee,  that  it  could  not  be 
maintained  against  the  evidence  that  the  structure  of  the 
universe  afforded. 

Having  thus  shown  the  irreconcileable  inconsistencies 
between  the  real  word  of  God  existing  in  the  universe  and 
that  which  is  called  the  word  of  God,  as  shown  to  us  in  a 
printed  book  that  any  man  might  make,  I  proceed  to  speak 
of  the  three  principal  means  that  have  been  employed  in  all 
«ges,  and  perhaps  in  all  countries,  to  impose  upon  mankind. 

Those  three  means  are  Mystery,  Miracle,  and  Prophesy. 
The  two  first  are  incompatible  with  true  religion,  and  the 
third  ought  always  to  be  suspected. 

With  respect  to  mystery,  every  thing  we  behold  is,  in 
in  one  sense,  a  mystery  to  us.  Our  own  existence  is  a  mys- 
tery ;  the  whole  vegetable  world  is  a  mystery.  We  cannot 
account  how  it  in  that  an  acorn,  when  pat  into  tho  ground, 


4S  fHE   AGE   OF   KEA8ON.  [PART  X. 

is  made  to  develops  itself,  and  become  an  oak.  "We  know 
not  how  it  is  that  the  seed  we  sow  unfolds  and  multiplies 
itself,  and  returns  to  us  such  an  abundant  interest  for  so 
email  a  capital. 

The  fact,  however,  as  distinct  from  the  operating  cause 
is  not  a  mystery,  because  we  see  it ;  and  we  know  also  the 
means  we  are  to  use,  which  is  no  other  than  putting  seed 
in  the  ground.  We  know,  therefore,  as  much  as  is  neces- 
sary for  us  to  know ;  and  that  part  of  the  operation  that  we 
do  not  know,  and  which  if  we  did,  we  could  not  perform, 
the  Creator  takes  upon  himself  and  performs  it  for  us.  We 
are.  therefore,  better  off  than  if  we  had  been  let  into  the 
secret,  and  left  to  do  it  for  ourselves. 

But  though  every  created  thing  is,  in  this  sense,  a  mys- 
tery, the  word  mystery  cannot  be  applied  to  moral  truth, 
any  more  than  obscurity  can  be  applied  to  light.  The  God 
in  whom  we  believe  is  a  God  of  moral  truth,  and  not  a  God 
of  mystery  or  obscurity.  Mystery  is  the  antagonist  of  truth. 
It  is  a  fog  of  human  invention,  that  obscures  truth,  and  rep- 
resents it  in  distortion.  Truth  never  envelopes  itself  in 
mystery ;  and  the  mystery  in  which  it  is  at  any  time  en- 
veloped, is  the  work  of  its  antagonist,  and  never  of  itself. 

Religion,  therefore,  being  the  belief  of  a  God,  and  the 
practice  of  moral  truth,  cannot  have  connection  with  mys- 
tery. The  belief  of  a  God,  so  far  from  having  any  thing  of 
mystery  in  it,  is  of  all  beliefs  the  most  easy,  because  it 
arises  to  us,  as  is  before  observed,  out  of  necessity.  And 
the  practice  of  moral  truth,  or,  in  other  words,  a  practical 
imitation  of  the  moral  goodness  of  God,  is  no  other  than 
our  acting  towards  each  other  as  he  acts  benignly  towards 
all.  We  cannot  serve  God  in  the  manner  we  serve  those 
who  cannot  do  without  such  service ;  and,  therefore,  the 
only  idea  we  can  have  of  serving  God,  is  that  of  contrib- 
uting to  the  happiness  of  the  living  creation  that  God  has 
made.  This  cannot  be  done  by  retiring  ourselves  from  the 
society  of  the  world,  and  spending  a  recluse  life  in  selfish 
devotion. 

The  very  nature  and  design  of  religion,  if  I  may  so  ex- 
press it,  prove  even  to  demonstration,  that  it  must  be  free 
from  every  thing  of  mystery,  and  unincumbered  with  every 
thing  that  is  mysterious.  Religion,  considered  as  a  duty,  is 
incumbent  upon  every  living  soul  alike,  and,  therefore, 
must  be  on  a  level  to  the  understanding.and  comprehension 
of  all.  Man  does  not  learn  religion  as  he  learns  the  secrets 


PJJtT  I.]  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  49 

and  mysteries  of  a  trade.  He  learns  the  theory  of  religion 
by  reflection.  It  arises  out  :f  the  action  of  his  own  mind 
npon  the  things  which  he  sees,  or  upon  what  he  may 
happon  to  hear  or  to  read  and  the  practice  joins  itself 
theroto. 

"When  men,  whether  from  policy  or  pious  fraud,  set  up 
systems  of  religion  incompatible  with  the  word  or  works  of 
God  in  the  creation,  and  not  only  above,  but  repugnant  to 
human  comprehension,  they  were  under  the  necessity  of 
inventing  or  adopting  a  word  that  should  oerve  as  a  bar  to 
all  questions,  inquiries  and  speculations.  The  word  mystery 
answered  this  purpose;  and  thus  it  has  happened  that 
religion,  which  is  in  itself  without  mystery,  has  been 
corrupted  into  a  fog  of  mysteries. 

As  mystery  answered  all  general  purj  oses,  miracle  fol- 
lowed as  an  occasional  auxiliary.  The  former  served  to 
bewilder  the  mind;  the  latter  to  puzzle  the  senses.  The 
one  was  the  lingo,  the  other  the  legerdemain. 

But  before  going  further  into  this  subject,  it  will  be 
proper  to  inquire  what  is  to  be  understood  by  a  miracle. 

In  the  same  sense  that  every  thing  may  be  said  to  be  a 
mystery,  so  also  may  it  be  said  that  every  thing  is  a  miracle, 
and  that  no  one  thing  is  a  greater  miracle  than  another. 
The  eJophant,  though  larger,  is  not  a  greater  miracle  than  a 
mite ;  nor  a  mountain  a  greater  miracle  than  an  atom.  To 
an  almighty  power,  it  is  no  more  difficult  to  make  the  one 
than  the  other ;  and  no  more  difficult  to  make  a  million  of 
worWs  than  to  make  one.  Every  thing,  therefore,  is  a 
miracle,  in  one  sense,  whilst  in  the  other  sense,  there  is  no 
sup*i  thing  as  a  miracle.  It  is  a  miracle  when  compared 
to  our  power,  and  ta  our  comprehension ;  it  is  not  a  miracle 
compared  to  the  power  that  performs  it ;  but  as  nothing  in 
this  description  conveys  the  idea  that  is  affixed  to  the  word 
miracle,  it  is  necessary  to  carry  the  inquiry  further. 

Mankind  have  conceived  to  themselves  certain  laws,  by 
which  what  they  call  nature  is  supposed  to  act ;  and  that  a 
miracle  is  something  contrary  to  the  operation  and  effect  of 
those  laws,  but  unless  we  know  the  whole  extent  of  those 
laws,  and  of  what  are  commoniy  called  the  powers  of  na- 
ture, we  are  not  able  to  judge  whether  any  thing  that  may 
appear  to  us  wonderful  or  miraculous,  be  within,  or  be 
beyond,  or  be  contrary  to,  her  natural  power  of  acting. 

The  ascension  of  a  man  several  miles  high  into  the  air, 
would  have  every  thing  in  it  that  constitutes  the  idea  of  a 
4 


50  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  [PAKT  £. 

miracle,  if  it  were  not  known  that  a  species  of  air  can  be 
generated  several  times  lighter  than  the  common  atmos- 
pheric air,  and  yet  possess  elasticity  enough  to  prevent  the 
balloon,  in  which  that  light  air  is  enclosed,  from  being 
compressed  into  as  many  times  less  bulk,  by  the  common 
air  that  surrounds  it.  In  like  manner,  extracting  flames 
or  sparks  of  fire  from  the  human  body,  as  visible  as  from  a 
Bteel  struck  with  a  flint,  and  causing  iron  or  steel  to  move 
without  any  visible  agent,  would  also  give  the  idea  of  a 
miracle,  if  we  were  not  acquainted  with  electricity  and 
magnetism ;  so  also  would  many  other  experiments  in  nat- 
ural philosophy,  to  those  who  are  not  acquainted  with  the 
subject.  The  restoring  persons  to  life,  who  are  to  appear- 
ance dead,  as  is  practised  upon  drowned  persons,  would  also 
be  a  miracle,  if  it  were  not  L_own  that  animation  is  capable 
of  being  suspended  without  being  extinct. 

Besides  these,  there  are  performances  by  slight  of  hand, 
and  by  persons  acting  in  concert,  that  have  a  miraculous 
appearance,  which  when  known,  are  thought  nothing  of. 
And,  besides  these,  there  are  mechanical  and  optical  decep- 
tions. There  in  now  an  exhibition  in  Paris  of  ghosts  or 
spectres,  which,  though  it  is  not  imposed  upon  the  specta- 
tors as  a  fact,  has  an  astonishing  appearance.  As,  there- 
fore, we  know  not  the  extent  to  which  either  nature  or  art 
can  go,  there  is  no  criterion  to  determine  what  a  miracle  is ; 
and  mankind,  in  giving  credit  to  appearance,  under  the 
idea  of  there  being  miracles,  are  subject  to  be  continually 
imposed  upon. 

Since  then  appearances  are  so  capable  of  deceiving,  and 
things  not  real  have  a  strong  resemblance  to  things  that  are, 
nothing  can  be  more  inconsistent  than  to  suppose  that  the 
Almighty  would  make  use  of  means,  such  as  are  called 
miracles,  that  would  subject  the  person  who  performed  them 
to  the  suspicion  of  being  an  impostor,  and  the  person  who 
related  them  to  be  suspected  of  lying,  and  the  doctrine  in- 
tended to  be  supported  thereby  to  be  suspected  as  a  fabu- 
lous invention. 

Of  all  the  modes  of  evidence  that  ever  were  intended 
to  obtain  belief  to  any  system  or  opinion  to  which  the  name 
of  religion  has  been  g;ven,  that  of  miracle,  however  suc- 
cessful the  imposition  may  have  been,  is  the  most  inconsis- 
tent. For,  in  the  first  place,  whenever  recourse  is  had  to 
show,  for  the  purpose  of  procuring  that  belief,  (for  a  miracle, 
diider  any  idea  of  the  word,  is  a  show,)  it  implies  a  lam*- 


PAST  I.]  THE   AGE   OF   REA8OA.  61 

ness  or  wickedness  in  the  doctrine  that  is  Breached.  And, 
in  the  second  place,  it  is  degrading  the  Almighty  into  the 
character  of  a  show-man,  playing  tricks  to  amuse  and  make 
the  people  stare  and  wonder.  It  is  also  the  most  equivocal 
sort  of  evidence  that  can  be  set  up ;  for  the  belief  is  not  to 
depead  upon  the  thing  called  a  miracle,  but  upon  the  credit 
of  the  reporter,  who  says  that  he  saw  it ;  and,  therefore,  the 
thing,  were  it  true,  would  have  no  better  chance  of  being 
believed  than  if  it  were  a  lie. 

Suppose  I  were  to  say,  that  when  I  sat  down  to  write 
this  book,  a  hand  presented  itself  in  the  air,  took  up  the  pen 
and  wrote  every  word  that  is  herein  written ;  would  any 
body  believe  me  ?  Certainly  they  would  not.  Would  they 
believe  me  a  whit  the  more  if  the  thing  had  been  a  fact ; 
certainly  they  would  not.  Since  then  a  real  miracle,  were 
it  to  happen,  would  be  subject  to  the  same  fate  as  the  false- 
hood, me  inconsistency  becomes  the  greater,  of  supposing 
the  Almighty  would  m#ke  use  of  means  that  would  not 
answer  the  purpose  for  which  they  were  intended,  even  if 
they  were  real. 

If  we  are  to  suppose  a  miracle  to  be  something  so  entire 
ly  out  of  the  course  of  what  is  called  nature,  that  she  must 
go  out  of  that  course  to  accomplish  it,  and  we  see  an  ac- 
count given  of  such  miracle  by  the  person  who  said  he  saw 
it,  it  raises  a  question  in  the  mind  very  easily  decided, 
which  is,  is  it  more  probable  that  nature  should  go  out  of 
her  course  or  that  a  man  should  tell  a  lie  ?  We  have  never 
seen,  in  our  time,  nature  go  out  of  her  course ;  but  we  have 
good  reason  to  believe  that  millions  of  lies  have  been  told 
in  the  same  time ;  it  is,  therefore,  at  least  millions  to  one, 
that  the  reporter  of  a  miracle  tells  a  lie. 

The  story  of  the  whale  swallowing  Jonah,  though  a 
whale  is  large  enough  to  do  it,  borders  greatly  on  the 
marvellous ;  but  it  would  have  approached  nearer  to  the 
idea  of  miracle,  if  Jonah  had  swallowed  the  whale.  In  this, 
which  may  serve  for  all  cases  of  miracles,  the  matter  would 
decide  itself  as  before  stated,  namely,  is  it  more  probable 
that  a  man  should  have  swallowed  a  whale  or  told  a  lie  ? 

But  suppose  that  Jonah  had  really  swallowed  the  whale, 
and  gone  with  it  in  his  belly  to  Ninevah,  and  to  convince 
the  people  that  it  was  true,  have  cast  it  up  in  their  sight, 
of  the  full  length  and  §ize  of  a  whale,  would  they  not  have 
believed  him  to  have  been  the  devil,  instead  of  a  prophet  If 
or,  if  the  whale  had  carried  Jonah  to  Ninevah,  and  out  him 


52  THE    AGE   OF   REASON.  [PABT  1 

ap  in  the  same  public  manner,  would  they  not  have  believ- 
ed the  whale  to  have  been  the  devil,  and  Jonah  one  of  hia 
imps? 

The  most  extraordinary  of  all  the  things  called  miracles, 
related  in  the  New  Testament,  is  that  of  the  devil  flying 
away  with  Jesus  Christ,  and  carrying  him  to  the  top  of  a 
high  mountain ;  and  to  the  top  of  the  highest  pinnacle  of 
the  temple,  and  showing  him  and  promising  to  him  all  the 
'kingdoms  of  the  world.  How  happened  it  that  he  did  not 
discover  America ;  or  is  it  only  with  kingdoms  that  his  sooty 
highness  has  any  interest? 

I  have  too  much  respect  for  the  moral  character  of 
Christ,  to  believe  that  he  told  this  whale  of  a  miracle  him- 
self: neither  is  it  easy  to  account  for  what  purpose  it  could 
have  been  fabricated,  unless  it  were  to  impose  upon  the 
connoisseurs  of  miracles,  as  is  sometimes  practised  upon  the 
connoisseurs  of  Queen  Anne's  farthings,  and  collectors  of 
relics  and  antiquities ;  or  to  render  the  belief  of  miracles, 
ridiculous,  by  outdoing  miracles,  3s  Don  Quixote  outdid 
chivalry ;  or  to  embarrass  the  belief  of  miracles,  by  making 
it  doubtful  by  what  power,  whether  of  God  or  the  devil, 
any  thing  called  a  miracle  was  performed.  It  requires, 
however,  a  great  deal  of  faith  in  the  devil  to  believe  this 
miracle. 

In  every  point  of  view  in  which  those  things  called 
miracles  can  be  placed  and  considered,  the  reality  of  them 
is  improbable,  and  their  existence  unnecessary.  They  would 
not,  as  before  observed,  answer  any  useful  purpose,  even  if 
they  were  true ;  for  it  is  more  difficult  to  obtain  belief  to  a 
miracle,  than  to  a  principle  .evidently  moral,  without  any 
miracle.  Moral  principle  speaks  universally  for  itself. 
Miracle  could  be  but  a  thing  of  the  moment,  and  seen  but 
by  a  few ;  after  this  it  requires  a  transfer  of  faith  from  God 
to  man  to  believe  a  miracle  upon  man's  report.  Instead, 
therefore,  of  admitting  the  recitals  of  miracles  as  evidence 
of  any  system  of  religion  being  true,  they  ought  to  be  con 
eidered  as  symptoms  of  its  being  fabulous.  It  is  necessary 
to  the  full  and  upright  character  of  truth  that  it  rejects  the 
crutch ;  and  it  is  consistent  with  the  character  of  fable,  to 
seek  the  aid  that  truth  rejects.  Thus  much  for  mystery  and 
miracle. 

As  mystery  and  miracle  took  charge  of  the  past  and  the 
present,  prophesy  took  charge  of  the  future,  and  rounded 
the  tenses  of  faith.  It  was  not  sufficient  to  know  what  had 


PAST  I.]  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  58 

been  done,  but  what  would  be  done.  The  supposed  prophet 
was  the  supposed  historian  of  times  to  come ;  and  if  he 
happened,  in  shooting  with  a  long  bow  of  a  thousand  years, 
to  strike  within  a  thousand  miles  of  a  mark,  the  ingenuity 
of  posterity  could  make  it  point-blank ;  and  if  he  happened 
to  be  directly  wrong,  it  was  only  to  suppose,  as  in  the  case 
of  Jonah  and  Ninevah,  that  God  had  repented  himself  and 
changed  his  mind.  What  a  fool  do  fabulous  systems  make 
of  man ! 

It  has  been  shown,  in  a  former  part  of  this  work,  that 
the  original  meaning  of  the  words  prophet  and  prophesying 
has  been  changed,  and  that  a  prophet,  in  the  sense  of  the 
word  as  now  used,  is  a  creature  of  modern  invention ;  and 
it  is  owing  to  this  change  in  the  meaning  of  the  words,  that 
the  flights  and  metaphors  of  the  Jewish  poets,  and  phrases 
and  expressions  now  rendered  obscure,  by  our  not  being 
acquainted  with  the  local  circumstances  to  which  they  ap- 
plied at  the  time  they  were  used,  have  been  erected  into 
prophecies,  and  made  to  bend  to  explanations,  at  the  will 
and  whimsical  conceits  of  sectaries,  expounders,  and  com- 
mentators. Every  thing  unintelligible  was  prophetical, 
and  every  thing  insignificant  was  typical.  A  blunder 
would  have  served  as  a  prophecy ;  and  a  dish-clout  for  a 
type. 

If  by  a  prophet  we  are  to  suppose  a  man,  to  whom  the 
Almighty  communicated  some  event  that  would  take  place 
in  future,  either  there  were  such  men,  or  there  were  not. 
Tf  there  were,  it  is  consistent  to  believe  that  the  event  so 
communicated,  would  be  told  in  terms  that  could  be  under- 
stood ;  and  not  related  in  such  a  loose  and  obscure  manner 
as  to  be  out  of  the  comprehensions  of  those  that  heard  it, 
and  so  equivocal  as  to  fit  almost  any  circumstance  that 
might  happen  afterwards.  It  is  conceiving  very  irrev- 
erently of  the  Almighty,  to  suppose  he  would  deal  in  this 
jesting  manner  with  mankind;  yet  all  the  things  called 
prophesies  in  the  book  called  the  Bible,  come  under  this 
description. 

But  it  is  with  prophecy  as  it  is  with  miracle ;  it  could  not 
answer  the  purpose  even  if  it  were  real.  Those  to  whom  a 
prophecv  should  be  told,  could  not  tell  whether  the  man 
prophesied  or  lied,  or  whether  it  had  been  revealed  to  him, 
or  whether  he  conceited  it ;  and  if  the  thing  that  he  prophe- 
sied, or  intended  to  prophesy,  should  happen,  or  some  thing 
like  it,  among  the  multitude  of  things  that  are  daily  hap* 


54  IHE   AGE   OF   KEASON.  [PAST  I 

peniug,  nobody  could  again  know  whether  he  foreknew  it, 
or  guessed  at  it,  or  whether  it  was  accidental.  A  prophet, 
therefore,  is  a  character  useless  and  unnecessary ;  and  the 
safe  side  of  the  case  is,  to  guard  against  being  imposed  upon 
by  not  giving  credit  to  such  relations. 

TJpon  the  whole,  mystery,  miracle,  and  prophecy,  are 
appendages  that  belong  to  fabulous  and  not  to  true  religion. 
They  are  the  means  by  which  so  many  Lo  heres !  and  Lo 
ther&t !  have  been  spread  about  the  world,  and  religion 
been  made  into  a  trade.  The  success  of  one  imposter  gave 
encouragement  to  another,  and  the  quieting  salvo  of  doing 
some  good  by  keeping  up  apioitsjraud  protected  them  from 
remorse. 

Having  now  extended  the  subject  to  a  greater  length 
than  I  first  intended,  I  shall  bring  it  to  a  close  by  abstract- 
ing a  summary  from  the  whole. 

First — That  the  idea  or  belief  of  a  word  of  God  existing 
in  print,  or  in  writing,  or  in  speech,  is  inconsistent  in  itself 
for  reasons  already  assigned.  These  reasons,  among  many 
others,  are  the  want  of  an  universal  language ;  the  muta- 
bility of  language ;  the  errors  to  which  translations  are  sub- 
ject ;  the  possibility  of  totally  suppressing  such  a  word ; 
the  probability  of  altering  it.  or  of  fabricating  the  whole, 
and  imposing  it  upon  the  world. 

Secondly — That  the  Creation  we  behold  is  the  real  and 
ever  existing  word  of  God,  in  which  we  cannot  be  deceived. 
It  proclaims  his  power,  it  demonstrates  his  wisdom,  it  man- 
ifests his  goodness  and  beneficence. 

Thirdly — That  the  moral  duty  of  man  consists  in  imitat 
ing  the  moral  goodness  and  beneficence  of  God  manifested 
in  the  creation  towards  all  his  creatures.  That  seeing  as  we 
daily  do  the  goodness  of  God  to  all  men,  it  is  an  example  call- 
ing upon  all  men  to  practise  the  same  towards  each  other ; 
and,  consequently,  that  every  thing  of  persecution  and  re- 
venge between  man  and  man,  and  every  thing  of  cruelty 
to  animals,  is  a  violation  of  moral  duty. 

I  trouble  not  myself  about  the  manner  of  future  exist- 
ence. I  content  myself  with  believing,  even  to  positive 
conviction,  that  the  power  that  gave  me  existence  is  able 
to  continue  it,  in  any  form  and  manner  he  pleases,  either 
with  or  without  this  body ;  and  it  appears  more  probable 
that  I  shall  continue  to  exist  hereafter,  than  that  I 


PAST  I.]  THE   AQB   OP   REASON.  55 

It  is  certain  that,  in  one  point,  all  nations  of  the  earth 
and  all  religions  agree ;  all  believe  in  a  God ;  the  things  in 
which  they  disagree,  are  the  redundancies  annexed  to  that 
belief ;  and,  therefore,  if  ever  an  universal  religion  should 
prevail,  it  will  not  be  believing  any  thing  new,  but  in  get- 
ting rid  of  redundancies,  and  believing  as  man  believed  at 
first.  Adam,  if  ever  there  was  sick  tt  man,  was  created  a 
Deist ;  but  in  the  mean  time,  let  every  man  follow,  as  he  hai 
a  right  to  do,  the  religion  and  the  worship  he  prefers. 


PREFACE 


i  HAVT  mentioned  in  the  former  part  of  The  Age  of 
ion,  that  it  had  long  been  my  intention  to  publish  my 
thoughts  upon  religion ;  but  that  I  had  originally  reserved 
it  to  a  later  period  in  life,  intending  it  to  be  the  las', 
work  I  should  undertake.  The  circumstances,  however, 
which  existed  in  France  in  the  latter  end  of  the  year  1793, 
determined  me  to  delay  it  no  longer.  The  just  and  humane 
principles  of  the  revolution  which  philosophy  had  first  dif- 
fused, had  been  departed  from.  The  idea,  always  danger- 
ous to  society  as  it  is  derogatory  to  the  Almighty,  that  priests 
could  forgive  sins,  thougn  it  seemed  to  exist  no  longer,  had 
blunted  the  feelings  of  humanity,  and  prepared  men  for 
the  commission  of  all  manner  of  crimes.  The  intolerant 
spirit  of  church  persecutions  had  transferred  itself  into  poli- 
tics ;  the  tribunal,  styled  revolutionary,  supplied  the  place 
of  an  inquisition ;  «md  the  guillotine  and  tne  stake  outdid 
the  fire  and  the  faggot  of  tne  church.  I  saw  many  of  my 
most  intimate  friends  destroyed;  others  daily  carried  to 
prison ;  and  I  had  reason  to  believe,  and  had  also  intima- 
tions given  me,  that  the  same  danger  was  approaching  my- 
self. 

Under  these  disadvantages,  I  began  the  former  part  of 
the  Age  of  Reason ;  I  had,  besides,  neither  Bible  nor  Testa- 
ment to  refer  to,  though  I  was  writing  against  both ;  nor 
could  I  procure  any ;  notwithstanding  which  I  have  pro- 
duced a  work  that  no  Bible  believer,  though  writing  at  hu 
ease,  and  with  a  library  of  church  books  about  him,  can 
refute.  Towards  the  latter  end  of  December  of  that  year, 
a  motion  was  made  and  carried,  to  exclude  foreigners  from 
the  convention.  There  were  but  two  in  it,  Anacharsis 
Cloote  and  myself ;  and  I  saw,  I  was  particularly  pointed 
at  by  Bourdon  de  1'Oise,  in  his  speech  on  that  motion. 

Conceiving,  after  this,  that  I  had  but  a  few  davs  of  liV- 


58  PREFACE. 

erty,  I  sat  down  and  brought  the  work  to  a  close  as  speedily 
as  possible ;  and  I  had  not  finished  it  more  than  six  hours, 
in  the  state  it  has  since  appeared,  before  a  guard  came  there 
about  three  in  the  morning,  with  an  order  signed  by  the  two 
committees  of  puolic  safety  and  surety -general,  for  putting 
me  in  arrestation  as  a  foreigner,  and  conveyed  me  to  the 
prison  of  the  Luxembourg.  I  contrived,  in  my  way  there, 
to  call  on  Joel  Barlow,  and  I  put  the  manuscript  of  the 
work  into  his  hands,  as  more  safe  than  in  my  possession  in 
prison ;  and  not  knowing  what  might  be  the  fate  in  France 
either  of  the  writer  or  the  work,  I  addressed  it  to  the 
protection  of  the  citizens  of  the  United  States. 

It  is  with  justice  that  I  say,  that  the  guard  who  executed 
this  order,  and  the  interpreter  of  the  Committee  of  general 
surety,  who  accompanied  them  to  examine  my  papers, 
treated  me  not  only  with  civility,  but  with  respect.  The 
keeper  of  the  Luxembourg.  Bennoit,  a  man  of  a  good  heart, 
showed  to  me  every  friendship  in  his  power,  as  did  also  all 
his  family,  while  he  continued  in  that  station.  He  was  re- 
moved from  it,  put  into  arrestation,  and  carried  before  the 
tribunal  upon  a  malignant  accusation,  but  acquitted. 

After  I  had  been  in  Luxembourg  about  three  weeks,  the 
Americans,  then  in  Paris,  went  in  a  body  to  the  convention, 
to  reclaim  me  as  their  countrymen  and  friend ;  but  were 
answered  by  the  President,  Yader,  who  was  also  President 
of  the  Committee  of  surety-general,  and  had  signed  the 
order  for  my  arrestation,  that  I  was  born  in  England.  I 
heard  no  more,  after  this,  from  any  person  out  of  the  walla 
of  the  prison,  till  the  fall  of  Robespierre,  on  the  the  9th  of 
Thermidor— July  27,  1794. 

About  two  months  before  this  event,  I  was  seized  with 
a  fever,  that  in  its  progress  had  every  symptom  of  becom- 
ing mortal,  and  from  the  effects  of  which  I  am  not  recover- 
ed. It  was  then  that  I  remembered  with  renewed  satisfac- 
tion, and  congratulated  myself  most  sincerely  on  having 
written  the  former  part  of  "  The  Age  of  Reason"  I  had 
then  but  little  expectation  of  surviving,  and  those  about  me 
had  less.  I  know,  therefore,  by  experience,  the  conscien- 
tious trial  of  my  own  principles. 

I  was  then  with  three  chamber  comrades,  Joseph  Van- 
heule,  of  Bruges,  Charles  Bastini,  and  Michael  Rubyns,  of 
Louvain.  The  unceasing  and  anxious  attention  of  these 
three  friends  to  me,  by  night  and  by  day,  I  rememember 
with  gratitude,  and  mention  with  pleasure.  It  happened 


PREFACE.  59 

that  a  physician  (Dr.  Graham)  and  a  surgeon,  (Mr.  Bond,) 
part  of  the  suite  of  General  O'Hara,  were  then  in  the  Lux- 
embourg. I  ask  not  myself,  whether  it  be  convenient  to 
them,  as  men  under  the  English  government,  That  I  ex- 
press to  them  my  thanks ;  but  I  should  reproach  myself  if 
I  did  not ;  and  also  to  the  physician  of  tlje  Luxembourg, 
Dr.  Markoski. 

I  have  some  reason  to  believe,  because  I  cannot  discover 
any  other  cause,  that  this  illness  preserved  me  in  existence. 
Among  the  papers  of  Robespierre  that  were  examined  and 
reported  upon  to  the  Convention,  by  a  Committee  of  Depu- 
ties, is  a  note  in  the  hand-writing  of  Robespierre,  in  the 
following  words : — 

"  Demander  que  Thomas  Paine  soit  To  demand  that  a  decree  of  accnea- 
decrete  d'accusation,  pour  1'interet  de  tion  be  passed  against  Thomas  Paine, 
1'Amerique  autant  que  de  la  France."  for  the  interest  of  America,  as  well  aa 

of  France. 

From  what  cause  it  was  that  the  intention  was  not  put  in 
execution,  I  know  not,  and  cannot  inform  myself;  and 
therefore  I  ascribe  it  to  impossibility,  on  account  of  that 
illness. 

The  Convention,  to  repair  as  much  as  lay  in  their  power 
the  injustice  I  had  sustained,  invited  me  publicly  and 
unanimously  to  return  into  the  Convention,  and  which  I 
accepted,  to  show  I  could  bear  an  injury  without  permit- 
ting it  to  injure  my  principles  or  my  aisposition.  It  is  not 
because  right  principles  have  been  violated,  that  they  are 
to  be  abandoned. 

I  have  seen,  since  I  have  been  at  liberty,  several  publi- 
cations written,  some  in  America,  and  some  in  England,  as 
Answers  to  the  former  part  of  "  The  Age  of  Reason."  If 
the  authors  of  these  can  amuse  themselves  \>y  so  doing,  I 
shall  not  interrupt  them.  They  may  write  against  the  work, 
and  against  me,  as  much  as  they  please  ;  they  do  me  more 
service  than  they  intend,  and  I  can  have  no  objection  that 
they  write  on.  They  will  find,  however,  by  this  second 
part,  without  its  being  written  as  an  answer  to  them,  that 
they  must  return  to  their  work,  and  spin  their  cobweb  over 
again.  The  first  is  brushed  away  by  accident. 

They  will  now  find  that  I  have  furnished  myself  with  a 
Bible  and  a  Testament ;  and  I  can  say  also  that  I  have 
found  them  to  be  much  worse  books  than  I  had  conceived. 
If  I  have  erred  in  any  thing,  in  the  former  part  of  the  Age 


60  PREFACE. 

of  Keason,  it  has  been  by  speaking  better  of  some  parts  of 
those  books  than  they  have  deserved. 

I  observe  that  all  my  opponents  resort,  more  or  less,  to 
what  they  call  Scripture  Evidence  and  Bible  authority,  to 
help  them  out.  They  are  so  little  masters  of  the  subject, 
as  to  confound  a  dispute  about  authenticity  with  a  dispute 
about  doctrines ;  I  will,  however,  put  them  right,  that  if 
they  should  be  disposed  to  write  any  more,  they  may  know 
how  to  begin. 

THOMAS  PAINR 

October, 


THE  AGE  OF  REASON. 


PAET  SECOND. 

IT  lias  often  been  said,  that  any  thing  may  be  proved 
from  the  Bible,  but  before  any  thing  can  be  admitted  as 
proved  by  the  Bible,  the  Bible  itself  must  be  proved  to  be 
true ;  for  if  the  Bible  be  not  true,  or  the  trutli  of  it  be  doubt- 
ful, it  ceases  to  have  authority,  and  cannot  be  admitted  as 
proof  of  any  thing. 

It  has  t)een  the  practice  of  all  Christian  commentators 
on  the  Bible,  and  of  all  Christian  priests  and  preachers,  to 
impose  the  Bible  on  the  world  as  a  mass  of  truth,  and  as 
the  word  of  God ;  they  have  disputed  and  wrangled,  and 
anathematized  each  other  about  the  supposable  meaning  of 
particular  parts  and  passages  therein ;  one  has  said  and  in- 
sisted that  such  a  passage  meant  such  a  thing ;  another  that 
it  meant  directly  the  contrary ;  and  a  third,  that  it  means 
neither  one  nor  the  other,  but  something  different  from 
both ;  and  this  they  call  understanding  the  Bible. 

It  has  happened,  that  all  the  answers  which  I  have  seen 
to  the  former  part  of  the  Age  of  Reason  have  been  written 
by  priests ;  and  these  pious  men  like  their  predecessors, 
contend  and  wrangle,  and  pretend  to  understand  the  Bible; 
each  understands  it  differently,  but  each  understands  it  best ; 
and  they  have  agreed  in  nothing,  but  in  telling  their  readers 
that  Thomas  Paine  understands  it  not. 

Now  instead  of  wasting  their  time,  and  heating  them- 
selves in  fractious  disputations  about  doctrinal  points  drawn 
from  the  Bible,  these  men  ought  to  know,  and  if  they  do 
not,  it  is  civility  to  inform  them,  that  the  first  thing  to  b« 
understood  is,  whether  there  is  sufficient  authority  for 
believing  the  Bible  to  be  the  word  of  God,  or  whether 
there  is  not  ? 

There  are  matters  in  that  book,  said  to  be  done  by  the 


62  THE    AGE   OF   REASON.  [PAST  tt 

express  command  of  God,  that  are  as  shocking  to  humanity, 
and  to  every  idea  we  have  of  moral  justice,  as  any  thing 
done  by  Robespierre,  by  Carrier,  by  Joseph  le  Bon,  in 
France,  by  the  English  government  in  the  East  Indies,  or 
by  any  other  assassin  in  modern  times.  When  we  read  in 
the  bcoks  ascribed  to  Moses,  Joshua,  etc.,  that  they  (the 
Israelites)  came  by  stealth  upon  whole  nations  of  people, 
svho,  as  the  history  itself  shows,  had  given  them  no  offence ; 
that  they  put  all  those  nations  to  the  sword ;  that  they  spared 
neither  age  nor  infancy  j  that  they  utterly  destroyed  men^ 
women  and  children  j  that  they  left  not  a  soul  to  breathe  / 
expressions  that  are  repeated  over  and  over  again  in  those 
books,  and  that  too  with  exulting  ferocity ;  are  we  surt, 
these  things  are  facts  ?  Are  we  sure  that  the  Creator  of 
man  commissioned  these  things  to  be  done ;  are  we  sure 
that  the  books  that  tell  us  so  were  written  by  his  authority  ? 

It  is  not  the  antiquity  of  a  tale  that  is  any  evidence  of 
its  truth ;  on  the  contrary,  it  is  a  symptom  of  its  being  fab- 
ulous ;  for  the  more  ancient  any  history  pretends  to  be,  the 
more  it  has  the  resemblance  of  a  fable.  The  origin  of  every 
nation  is  buried  in  fabulous  tradition,  and  that  of  the  Jews 
is  as  much  to  be  suspected  as  any  other.  To  charge  the 
commission  of  acts  upon  the  Almighty,  which  in  their  own 
nature,  and  by  every  rule  of  moral  justice,  are  crimes,  as 
ill  assassination  is,  and  more  especially  the  assassination  of 
infants,  is  matter  of  serious  concern.  The  Bible  tells  ws, 
that  those  assassinations  were  done  by  the  express  command 
of  God.  To  believe,  therefore,  the  Bible  to  be  true,  we 
must  unbelieve  all  our  belief  in  the  moral  justice  of  God ; 
for  wherein  could  crying  or  smiling  infants  offend  ?  And 
to  read  the  Bible  without  horror,  we  must  undo  every  thing 
that  is  tender,  sympathizing,  and  benevolent  in  the  heart 
of  man.  Speaking  for  myself,  if  I  had  no  other  evidence 
that  the  Bible  was  fabulous,  than  the  sacrifice  I  must  make 
to  believe  it  to  be  true,  that  alone  would  be  sufficient  to 
determine  my  choice. 

But  in  addition  to  all  the  moral  evidence  against  the 
Bible,  I  will  in  the  progress  of  this  work,  produce  such  other 
evidence,  as  even  a  priest  cannot  deny ;  and  show,  from  that 
evidence,  that  the  Bible  is  not  entitled  to  credit,  as  being 
the  word  of  God. 

But,  before  I  proceed  to  this  examination,  I  will  show 
wherein,  the  Bible  differs  from  all  other  ancient  writings 
with  respect  to  the  nature  of  the  evidence  necessary  to 


PART  II.  J  THE   AGB   OF   REASON.  68 

establish  its  authenticity ;  and  this  is  more  proper  to  be 
done,  because  the  advocates  of  the  Bible,  in  their  answers 
to  the  former  part  of  the  Age  of* Reason,  undertake  to  say, 
and  they  put  some  stress  thereon,  that  the  authenticity  of 
the  Bible  is  as  well  established  as  that  of  any  other  ancient 
book ;  as  if  our  belief  of  the  one  could  become  any  rule  for 
our  belief  of  the  other. 

I  know,  however,  but  of  one  ancient  book  that  authcxita- 
tively  challenges  universal  consent  and  belief,  and  that  is 
Euclid's  Elements  of  Geometry  /*  and  the  reason  is,  because 
it  is  a  book  of  self-evident  demonstration,  entirely  indepen- 
dent of  its  author,  and  of  every  thing  relating  to  time,  place 
and  circumstance.  The  matters  contained  in  that  book 
would  have  the  same  authority  they  now  have,  aad  they 
been  written  by  any  other  person,  or  had  the  work  been 
anonymous,  or  had  the  author  never  been  known ;  for  the 
identical  certainty  of  who  was  the  author,  makes  no  part 
of  our  belief  of  the  matters  contained  in  the  book.  But  it 
is  quite  otherwise  with  respect  to  books  ascribed  to  Moses, 
to  Joshua,  to  Samuel,  &c.,  those  are  books  of  testimony, 
and  they  testify  of  things  naturally  incredible ;  and,  there- 
fore, the  whole  of  our  belief,  as  to  the  authenticity  of  those 
books,  rest,  in  the  first  place,  upon  the  certainty  that  they 
were  written  by  Moses,  Joshua,  and  Samuel ;  secondly, 
upon  the  credit  we  give  to  their  testimony.  "We  may  believe 
the  first,  that  is,  we  may  believe  the  certainty  of  the  author- 
ship, and  yet  not  the  testimony  ;  in  the  same  manner  that 
we  may  believe  that  a  certain  person  gave  evidence  upon 
a  case  and  yet  not  believe  the  evidence  that  he  gave,  feut 
if  it  should  be  found,  that  the  books  ascribed  to  Moses, 
Joshua,  and  Samuel,  were  not  written  by  Moses,  Joshua, 
and  Samuel,  and  every  part  of  the  authority  and  authenticity 
of  those  books  is  gone  at  once ;  for  there  can  be  no  such 
thing  as  forged  or  invented  testimony ;  neither  can  there 
be  anonymous  testimony,  more  especially  as  to  things 
naturally  incredible;  such  as  that  of  talking  with  God 
face  to  face,  or  that  of  the  sun  and  moon  standing  still  at 
the  command  of  a  man.  The  greatest  part  of  the  other 
ancient  books  are  works  of  genius ;  of  which  kind  are  those 
ascribed  to  Homer,  to  Plato,  to  Aristotle,  to  Demosthenes, 
to  Cicero,  &c.  Here  again  the  author  is  not  essential  in 

•  Euclid,  according  to  chronologies  aistory,  lived  three  bundled  year* 
before  Christ,  and  about  one  hundred  before  Archimedes;  he  was  of  the  city 
at  Alexandria,  in  Egypt 


64  TOE   AOa,    OF   KEA8ON.  [PABT  IL 

the  credit  we  give  to  any  of  those  works ;  for,  as  works  of 
genius,  they  would  have  the  same  merit  they  have  now, 
were  they  anonymous.  M)body  believes  the  Trojan  story, 
as  related  by  Homer,  to  be  true — for  it  is  the  poet  only  that 
is  admired:  and  the  merit  of  the  poet  will  remain,  though 
the  story  be  fabulous.  But  if  we  disbelieve  the  matters 
related  by  the  Bible  authors  (Moses  for  instance)  as  we  dis- 
believe the  things  related  by  Homer,  there  remains  nothing 
of  Moses  in  our  estimation,  but  an  impostor.  As  to  the 
ancient  historians,  from  Herodotus  to  Tacitus,  we  credit 
them  as  far  as  they  relate  things  probable  and  credible, 
and  no  further:  for  if  we  do,  we  must  believe  the  two 
miracles  which  Tacitus  relates  were  performed  by  Ves- 
pasian,  that  ^f  curing  a  lame  man,  and  a  blind  man,  in  just 
the  same  manner  as  the  same  things  are  told  of  Jesus 
Christ  by  his  historians.  We  must  also  believe  the  mir 
acles  cited  by  Joseph  us,  that  of  the  sea  of  Pamphilia  open- 
ing to  let  Alexander  and  his  army  pass,  as  is  related  of  the 
Bed  Sea  in  Exodus.  These  miracles  are  quite  as  well 
authenticated  as  the  Bible  miracles,  and  yet  we  do  not 
believe  them ;  consequently  the  degree  of  evidence  neces- 
sary to  establish  our  belief  of  things  naturally  incredible, 
whether  in  the  Bible  or  elsewhere,  is  far  greater  than  that 
which  obtains  our  belief  to  natural  and  probable  things ; 
and,  therefore,  the  advocates  for  the  Bible  have  no  claim 
to  our  belief  of  the  Bible,  because  that  we  believe  things 
stated  in  other  ancient  writings ;  since  we  believe  the 
things  stated  in  these  writings  no  further  than  they  are 
probable  and  credible,  or  because  they  are  self-evident, 
like  Euclid ;  or  admire  them  because  they  are  elegant,  like 
Homer;  or  approve  them  because  they  are  sedate,  like 
Plato;  or  judicious,  like  Aristotle. 

Having  premised  these  things,  I  proceed  to  examine  the 
authenticity  of  the  Bible,  and  I  begin  with  what  are  called 
the  five  books  of  Moses,  Genesis,  Exodus,  Leviticus,  Numr 
bers,  and  Deuteronomy.  My  intention  is  to  show  that  those 
books  are  spurious,  and  that  Moses  is  not  the  author  of 
them ;  and  still  further,  that  they  were  not  written  in  the 
time  of  Moses,  nor  till  several  hundred  years  afterwards ; 
that  they  are  no  other  than  an  attempted  history  of  the 
life  of  Moses,  and  of  the  times  in  which  he  is  said  to  have 
lived,  and  also  of  the  times  prior  thereto,  written  by  some 
very  ignorant  and  stupid  pretenders  to  authorship,  several 
hundred  years  after  the  death  of  Mobes,  as  men  now  write 


TAUT  H.]  THE   AGE  OF   BEASON.  86 

histories  of  things  that  happened,  or  are  supposed  to  have 
happened,  several  hundred  or  several  thousand  years  ago. 

The  evidence  that  I  shall  produce  in  this  case  is  from 
the  books  themselves ;  and  I  will  confine  myself  to  this 
evidence  only.  Were  I  to  refer  for  proof  to  any  of  the 
ancient  authors,  whom  the  advocates  of  the  Bible  call  pro- 
fane authors,  they  would  controvert  that  authority,  as  t 
controvert  theirs ;  I  will  therefore  meet  them  on  their  own 
ground,  and  oppose  them  with  their  own  weapon,  the  Bibln. 

In  the  first  place,  there  is  no  affirmative  evidence  that 
Moses  is  the  author  of  those  books;  and  that  he  is  the 
author,  is  altogether  an  unfounded  opinion,  got  abroad  no- 
body knows  how.  The  style  and  manner  in  which  those 
books  are  written,  give  no  room  to  believe,  or  even  to  sup- 
pose, they  were  written  by  Moses ;  for  it  is  altogether  the 
style  and  manner  of  another  person  speaking  of  Moses.  In 
Exodus,  Leviticus  and  Numbers,  (for  every  thing  in  Genesis 
is  prior  to  the  times  of  Moses  and  not  the  least  allusion  is 
made  to  him  therein,)  the  whole,  I  say,  of  these  books  is  in 
the  third  person ;  it  is  always,  the  Lord  said  unto  Moses,  or 
Moses  said  unto  the  Lord :  or  Moses  said  unto  the  people, 
or  the  people  said  unto  Moses;  and  this  is  the  style  and 
manner  that  historians  use,  in  speaking  of  the  person  whose* 
lives  and  actions  they  are  writing.  It  may  be  said  that  a 
man  may  speak  of  himself  in  the  third  person ;  and,  there- 
fore, it  may  be  supposed  that  Moses  did ;  but  supposition 
proves  nothing;  and  if  the  advocates  for  the  belief  that 
Moses  wrote  those  books  himself,  have  nothing  better  to 
advance  than  supposition,  they  may  as  well  be  silent. 

But  granting  the  grammatical  right,  that  Moses  might 
speak  of  himself  in  the  third  person,  because  any  man 
might  speak  of  himself  in  that  manner,  it  cannot  be  ad- 
mitted as  a  fact  in  those  books,  that  it  is  Moses  who  speaks, 
without  rendering  Moses  truly  ridiculous  and  absurd : — for 
example,  Numbers,  chap.  xii.  ver.  3.  "Now  the  man  Mo- 
tes was  very  meek,  above  all  men  which  were  on  the  face  of 
the  earth."  If  Moses  said  this  of  himselt,  instead  of  being 
the  meekest  of  men,  he  was  one  of  the  most  vain  and 
arrogant  of  coxcombs ;  and  the  advocates  for  those  books 
may  now  take  which  side  they  please,  for  both  sides  are 
against  them ;  if  Moses  was  not  the  author,  the  books  are 
without  authority;  and  if  he  was  the  author,  the  author 
was  without  credit,  because  to  boast  of  meekness,  is  the 
reverse  of  meekness,  and  is  a  lie  in  sentiment. 
5 


66  THE   AGE   OF   BEA.9ON.  [PART  tt 

In  Deuteronomy,  the  style  and  manner  of  writing  marks 
more  evidently  than  in  the  former  books,  that  Moses  is  not 
the  writer.  The  manner  here  used  is  dramatical :  the  writer 
opens  the  subject  by  a  short  introductory  discourse,  and 
then  introduces  Moses  in  the  act  of  speaking,  and  when  he 
has  made  Moses  finish  his  harangue,  he  (the  writer)  re- 
sumes his  own  part,  and  speaks  till  he  brings  Moses  forward 
again,  and  at  last  closes  the  scene  with  an  account  of  the 
death,  funeral  and  character  of  Moses. 

This  interchange  of  speakers  occurs  four  times  in  this 
book  :  from  the  first  verse  of  the  first  chapter,  to  the  end  of 
the  fifth  verse,  it  is  the  writer  who  speaks ;  he  then  intro- 
duces Moses  as  in  the  act  of  making  his  harangue,  and 
this  continues  to  the  end  of  the  40th  verse  of  the  fouriii 
chapter ;  here  the  writer  drops  Moses,  and  speaks  historic- 
ally of  what  was  done  in  consequence  of  what  Moses,  when 
living,  is  supposed  to  have  said,  and  which  the  writer  has 
dramatically  rehearsed. 

The  writer  opens  the  subject  again  in  the  first  verse  of 
the  fifth  chapter,  though  it  is  only  by  saying,  that  Moses 
called  the  people  of  Israel  together;  he  then  introduces 
Moses  as  before,  and  continues  him,  as  in  the  act  of  speak- 
ing, to  the  end  of  the  26th  chapter.  He  does  the  same 
thing  at  the  beginning  of  the  27th  chapter;  and  continues 
Moses,  as  in  the  act  of  speaking,  to  the  end  of  the  28th 
chapter.  At  the  29th  chapter  the  writer  speaks  again 
through  the  whole  of  the  first  verse,  and  the  first  line  of 
the  second  verse,  where  he  introduces  Moses  for  the  last 
time,  and  continues  him,  as  in  the  act  of  speaking,  to  the 
end  of  the  33d  chapter. 

The  writer  having  now  finished  the  rehearsal  on  the  part 
of  Moses,  comes  forward,  and  speaks  through  the  whole  of 
the  last  chapter;  he  begins  by  telling  the  reader,  that 
Moses  went  up  to  the  top  of  Pisgah ;  that  he  saw  from 
thence  the  land  which  (the  writer  says)  had  been  promised 
to  Abraham,  Isaac  and  Jacob  ;  that  he,  Moses,  died  there, 
in  the  land  of  Moab,  but  that  no  man  knoweth  of  his  se- 
pulchre unto  this  day,  that  is,  unto  the  time  in  which  the 
writer  lived,  who  wrote  the  book  of  Deuteronomy.  The 
writer  then  tells  us,  that  Moses  was  110  years  of  age  when 
he  died — that  his  eye  was  not  dim,  nor  his  natural  force 
abated  ;  and  he  concludes  by  saying,  that  there  arose  not  a 
prophet  since  in  Israel  like  unto  Moses,  whom,  says  thii 
anonymous  writer,  the  Lord  knew  face  to  face. 


PART  n  ]  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  67 

Having  thus  shown,  as  far  as  grammatical  evidence 
applies,  that  Moses  was  not  the  writer  of  those  books,  I  will, 
after  making  a  few  observations  on  the  inconsistencies  of 
the  writer  of  the  book  of  Deuteronomy,  proceed  to  show, 
from  the  historical  and  chronological  evidence  contained  in 
those  books,  that  Moses,  was  not,  because  he  could  not  be, 
the  writer  of  them ;  and  consequently,  that  there  is  no 
authority  for  believing,  that  the  inhuman  and  horrid  butch- 
eries of  men,  women,  and  children,  told  in  those  books, 
were  done,  as  those  books  say  they  were,  at  the  command 
of  God.  It  is  a  duty  incumbent  on  every  true  Deist,  that 
he  vindicate  the  moral  justice  of  God  against  the  calumnies 
of  the  Bible. 

The  writer  of  the  book  of  Deuteronomy,  whoever  he 
was,  (for  it  is  an  anonymous  work,)  is  obscure,  and  also  in 
contradiction  with  himself,  in  the  account  he  has  given  of 
Moses. 

After  telling  that  Moses  went  to  the  top  of  Pisgah  (and 
:t  does  not  appear  from  any  account  that  he  ever  came 
down  again)  he  tells  us,  that  Moses  died  there  in  the  land 
of  Moab,  and  that  he  buried  him  in  a  valley  in  the  land  of 
Moab ;  but  as  there  is  no  antecedent  to  the  pronoun  he, 
there  is  no  knowing  who  he  was  that  did  bury  him.  If  the 
writer  meant  that  he  (God)  buried  him,  how  should  he  (the 
writer)  know  it  ?  or  why  should  we  (the  readers)  believe 
him  ?  since  we  know  not  who  the  writer  was  that  tells  us 
so,  for  certainly  Moses  could  not  himself  tell  where  he  was 
buried. 

The  writer  also  tells  us,  that  no  man  knoweth  where  the 
sepulchre  of  Moses  is  unto  this  day,  meaning  the  time  in 
which  this  writer  lived ;  how  then  should  he  know  that 
Moses  was  buried  in  a  valley  in  the  land  of  Moab  ?  for  as 
the  writer  lived  long  after  the  time  of  Moses,  as  is  evident 
from  his  using  the  expression  of  unto  this  day,  meaning  a 
great  length  of  time  after  the  death  of  Moses,  he  certainly 
was  not  at  his  fnneral ;  and  on  the  other  hand,  it  is  impossi- 
ble that  Moses  himself  could  say,  that  no  man  Jcnoweth 
where  the  sepulchre  is  unto  this  day.  To  make  Moses  the 
speaker,  would  be  an  improvement  on  the  play  of  a  child 
mat  hides  himself  and  cries  nobody  can  find  me  /  nobody 
can  find  Moses. 

This  writer  has  nowhere  told  us  how  he  came  by  the 
speeches  which  he  has  put  into  the  mouth  of  Moses  to 
apeak,  and,  therefore,  we  nave  a  right  to  conclude,  that  h« 


68  THE  AGE  OF  REASON.  [PART  H. 

eitlier  composed  them  himself,  or  wrote  them  from  orai 
tradition.  One  01  the  other  of  these  is  the  more  probable, 
since  he  has  given,  in  the  fifth  chapter,  a  table  of  command- 
ments, in  which  that  called  the  fourth  commandment  ig 
different  from  the  fourth  commandment  in  the  twentieth 
chapter  of  Exodus.  In  that  of  Exodus,  the  reason  given 
for  keeping  the  seventh  day  is,  "  because  (says  the  com- 
mandment) God  made  the  heavens  and  the  earth  in  six 
days,  and  rested  on  the  seventh ;"  but  in  that  of  Deuter- 
onomy, the  reason  given  is,  that  it  was  the  day  on  which 
the  children  of  Israel  came  out  of  Egypt,  and  therefore, 
says  this  commandment,  the  Lord  thy  God  commanded  thee 
to  keep  the  sabbath-day.  This  makes  no  mention  of  the 
creation,  nor  that  of  the  coming  out  of  Egypt.  There  are 
also  many  things  given  as  laws  of  Moses  in  this  book,  that 
are  not  to  be  found  in  any  of  the  other  books;  among  which 
is  that  inhuman  and  brutal  law,  chap.  xxi.  ver.  18,  19,  20, 
21,  which  authorizes  parents,  the  father  and  the  mother,  to 
bring  their  own  children  to  have  them  stoned  to  death  for 
what  it  is  pleased  to  call  stubbornness.  But  priests  have 
always  been  fond  of  preaching  up  Deuteronomy,  for  Deu- 
teronomy preaches  up  tythes ;  and  it  is  from  this  book, 
chap.  xxv.  ver.  4,  they  have  taken  the  phrase,  and  applied 
it  to  tything,  that  thou  shalt  not  muzzle  the  ox  when  he 
t/readeih  out  the  corn  /  and  that  this  might  not  escape  ob- 
servation, they  have  noted  it  in  the  table  of  contents  at  the 
head  of  the  chapter,  though  it  is  only  a  single  verse  of  less 
than  two  lines.  O  !  priests !  priests !  ye  are  willing  to  be 
compared  to  an  ox,  for  the  sake  of  tythes.  Though  it  is 
impossible  for  us  to  know  identically  who  the  writer  of 
Deuteronomy  was,  it  is  not  difficult  to  discover  him  pro- 
fessionally, that  he  was  some  Jewish  priest,  who  lived,  as  I 
shall  show  in  the  course  of  this  work,  at  least  three  hun- 
dred and  fifty  years,  after  the  time  of  Moses. 

I  come  now  to  speak  of  the  historical  and  chronological 
evidence.  The  chronology  that  I  shall  use  is  the  Bible 
chronology  ;  for  I  mean  not-  to  go  out  of  the  Bible  for 
evidence  of  any  thing,  but  to  make  the  Bible  itself  prove 
historically  and  chronologically,  that  Moses  is  not  the 
author  of  the  books  ascribed  to  him.  It  is,  therefore, 
proper  that  I  inform  the  reader,  (such  an  one  at  least  as 
may  not  have  the  opportunity  of  knowing  it,)  that  in  the 
larger  Bibles,  and  also  in  some  smaller  ones,  there  is  a 
series  of  chronology  printed  in  the  margin  of  every  page, 


PART  n.]  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  69 

for  the  purpose  of  showing  how  long  the  historical  matters 
stated  in  each  page  happened,  or  are  supposed  to  have 
happened,  before  Cnrist,  and,  consequently,  the  distance  of 
time  between  one  historical  circumstance  and  another. 

I  began  with  the  book  of  Genesis.  In  the  14th  chapter 
of  Genesis,  the  writer  gives  an  account  of  Lot  being  taken 
prisoner  in  a  battle  between  the  four  kings  against  five,  and 
carried  off;  and  that  when  the  account  of  Lot  being  taken 
came  to  Abraham,  he  armed  all  his  household  and  marched 
to  rescue  Lot  from  the  captors ;  and  that  he  pursued  them 
unto  Dan.  (ver.  14.) 

To  show  in  what  manner  this  expression  of  pursuing 
them  unto  Dan  applies  to  the  case  in  question,  I  will  refer 
to  two  circumstances,  the  one  in  America,  the  other  in 
France.  The  city  now  called  New  York,  in  America,  was 
originally  New  Amsterdam ;  and  the  town  in  France,  lately 
called  Havre  Marat,  was  before  called  Havre  de  Grace. 
New  Amsterdam  was  changed  to  New  York  in  the  year 
1664 ;  Havre  de  Grace  to  Havre  Marat  in  1793.  Should, 
therefore,  any  writing  be  found,  though  without  date,  in 
which  the  name  of  New-York  should  be  mentioned,  it 
would  be  certain  evidence  that  such  a  writing  could  not 
have  been  written  before,  and  must  have  been  written  after 
New  Amsterdam  was  changed  to  New  York,  and  conse- 
quently not  till  after  the  year  1664,  or  at  least  during  the 
course  of  that  year.  And,  in  like  manner,  any  dateless 
writing,  with  the  name  of  Havre  Marat,  would  be  certain 
evidence  that  such  a  writing  must  have  been  written  after 
Havre  de  Grace  became  Havre  Marat,  and  consequently 
not  till  after  the  year  1793,  or  at  least  during  the  course  of 
that  year. 

I  now  come  to  the  application  of  those  cases,  and  to  show 
that  there  was  no  such  place  as  JDan,  till  many  years  after 
the  death  of  Moses ;  and  consequently,  that  Moses  could 
not  be  the  writer  of  the  book  of  Genesis,  where  this  ac- 
count of  pursuing  them  unto  Dan  is  given. 

The  place  that  is  called  Dan  in  the  Bible  was  originally 
a  town  of  the  Gentiles,  called  Laish ;  and  when  the  tribe 
of  Dan  seized  upon  this  town,  they  changed  its  name  to 
Dan,  in  commemoration  of  Dan,  who  was  the  father  of  that 
tribe,  and  the  great  grandson  of  Abraham. 

To  establish  this  in  proof,  it  is  necessary  to  refer  from 
Genesis  to  the  18th  chapter  of  the  book  called  the  Book  of 
Judges.  It  is  there  said  (ver.  27)  that  thty  (the  Dmiitoa) 


70  THE    AGE   OB    REASON.  [PABT  H 

came  unto  Laish  to  a  people  that  were  quiet  and  secure,  and 
they  smote  them  with  the  edge  of  the  sword  (the  Bible  is 
filled  with  murder)  and  burned  the  city  with  fore  j  and  they 
built  a  city,  (ver.  28,)  and  dwelt  therein,  and  they  called  the 
name  of  the  city  Dan,  after  the  name  of  Dan,  their  father^ 
howbeu  the  name  of  the  city  was  Laish  at  the  first. 

This  account  of  the  Danites  taking  possession  of  Laish 
and  changing  it  to  Dan,  is  placed  in  the  Book  of  Judges 
immediately  after  the  death  of  Sampson.  The  death  of 
Sampson  is  said  to  have  happened  1120  years  before  Christ, 
and  that  of  Moses  1451  before  Christ,  and,  therefore,  ac- 
cording to  the  historical  arrangement,  the  place  was  not 
called  Dan  till  331  years  after  the  death  of  Moses. 

There  is  a  striking  confusion  between  the  historical  and 
the  chronological  arrangement  in  the  Book  of  Judges.  The 
five  last  chapters,  as  they  stand  in  the  book,  17,  18,  19,  20, 
21,  are  put  chronologically  before  all  the  preceding  chap- 
ters ;  they  are  made  to  be  28  years  before  the  16th  chap- 
ter, 266  before  the  15th,  245  before  the  13th,  195  before  the 
9th,  90  before  the  4th,  and  15  years  before  the  first  chapter. 
This  shows  the  uncertain  and  fabulous  state  of  the  Bible. 
According  to  the  chronological  arrangement,  the  taking  of 
Laish  and  giving  it  the  name  of  Dan,  is  made  to  be  20  years 
after  the  death  of  Joshua,  who  was  the  successor  of  Moses ; 
and  by  the  historical  order  as  it  stands  in  the  book,  it  is 
made  to  be  306  years  after  the  death  of  Joshua,  and  331 
after  that  of  Moses;  but  they  both  exclude  Moses  from 
being  the  writer  of  Genesis,  because,  according  to  either 
of  the  statements,  no  such  place  as  Dan  existed  in  the  time 
of  Moses ;  and  therefore  the  writer  of  Genesis  must  have 
been  some  person  who  lived  after  the  town  of  Laish  had 
the  name  of  Dan ;  and  who  that  person  was,  nobody  knows ; 
and  consequently  the  Book  of  Genesis  is  anonymous  and 
without  authority. 

I  proceed  now  to  state  another  point  of  historical  and 
chronological  evidence,  and  to  show  therefrom,  as  in  the 
preceding  case,  that  Moses  is  not  the  author  of  the  book  of 
Genesis. 

In  the  36th  chapter  of  Genesis  there  is  given  a  genealogy 
of  the  sons  and  descendents  of  Esau,  who  are  called  Edom- 
ites,  and  also  a  list,  by  name,  of  the  kings  of  Edom ;  in  enu- 
merating of  which,  it  is  said,  verse  31,  "And  these  are 
the  kings  that  reigned  in  Edom,  before  there  reigned  any 
ov&r  the  children  of  Israel" 


PABT  n.]  THE    AGE  OF   REA8CN.  71 

Now,  were  any  dateless  writings  to  be  found,  in  which, 
speaking  of  any  past  events,  the  writer  should  say,  these 
things  happenea  before  there  was  any  Congress  in  America, 
or  before  there  was  any  Convention  in  France,  it  would  be 
evidence  that  such  writings  could  not  have  been  written 
before,  and  could  only  be  written  after  there  was  a  Con- 
gress in  America,  or  a  Convention  in  France,  as  the  case 
might  be ;  and,  consequently,  that  it  could  not  be  written 
by  any  person  who  died  before  there  was  a  Congress  in  the 
one  country,  or  a  Convention  in  the  other. 

Nothing  is  more  frequent,  as  well  in  history  as  in  con- 
versation, than  to  refer  to  a  fact  in  the  room  of  a  date :  it 
is  most  natural  so  to  do,  because  a  fact  fixes  itself  in  the 
memory  better  than  a  date ;  secondly,  because  the  fact  in- 
cludes the  date,  and  serves  to  excite  two  ideas  at  once ;  and 
this  manner  of  speaking  by  circumstances  implies  as  posi- 
tively that  the  fact  alluded  to  is  past,  as  if  it  was  so  ex- 
pressed. "When  a  person  speaking  upon  any  matter,  says, 
it  was  before  I  was  married,  or  before  my  son  was  born,  or 
before  I  went  to  America,  or  before  I  went  to  France,  it  is 
absolutely  understood,  and  intended  to  be  understood,  that 
he  has  been  married,  that  he  has  had  a  son,  that  he  has 
been  in  America,  or  been  in  France.  Language  does  not 
admit  of  using  this  mode  of  expression  in  any  other  sense ; 
and  whenever  such  an  expression  is  found  any  where,  it  can 
only  be  understood  in  the  sense  in  which  only  it  could  have 
been  used. 

The  passage,  therefore,  that  I  have  quoted — "  that  these 
are  the  kings  that  reigned  in  Edom,  before  there  reigned 
any  king  over  the  children  of  Israel,"  could  only  have  been 
written  after  the  first  king  began  to  reign  over  them ;  and, 
consequently,  that  the  Book  of  Genesis  so  far  from  having 
been  written  by  Moses,  could  not  have  been  written  till 
the  time  of  Saul  at  least.  This  is  the  positive  sense  of  the 
passage ;  but  the  expression,  any  king,  implies  more  kings 
than  one,  at  least  it  implies  two,  and  this  will  carry  it  to 
the  time  of  David ;  and,  if  taken  in  a  general  sense,  it 
carries  itself  through  all  the  time  of  the  Jewish  monarchy. 

Had  we  met  with  this  verse  in  any  part  of  the  Bible 
that  professed  to  have  been  written  after  kings  began  to 
reign  in  Israel,  it  would  have  been  impossible  not  to  have 
seen  the  application  of  it.  It  happens  then  that  this  is  the 
case ;  the  two  books  of  Chronicles,  which  gave  a  history 
of  all  the  kings  ef  Israel,  are  professedly,  as  well  as  in  fact, 


78  THE   AGE   OI    REASON.  [PART  EL 

written  after  the  Jewish  monarchy  began ;  and  this  versa 
that  I  have  quoted,  and  all  the  remaining  verses  of  the  36th 
chapter  of  Genesis,  are,  word  for  word,  in  the  first  chapter 
of  Chronicles,  beginning  at  the  43d  verse. 

It  was  with  consistency  that  the  writer  of  the  Chronicles 
could  say,  as. he  has  said,  1st  Chron.  chap.  i.  ver.  43,  These 
are  tJte  kings  that  reigned  in  Edom>  before  there  reigned  any 
king  over  the  children  of  Israel,  because  he  was  going  to 
give,  and  has  given  a  list  of  the  kings  that  had  reigned  in 

•         ••  "iii  • 

Israel ;  but  as  it  is  impossible  that  the  same  expression 
could  have  been  used  before  that  period,  it  is  as  certain  as 
any  thing  can  be  proved  from  historical  language,  that  this 
part  of  Genesis  is  taken  from  Chronicles,  and  that  Genesis  is 
not  so  old  as  Chronicles,  and  probably  not  so  old  as  the  book 
of  Homer,  or  as  ^Esop's  Fables,  admitting  Homer  to  have 
been,  as  the  tables  of  chronology  state,  contemporary  with 
David  or  Solomon,  and  JEsop  to  have  lived  about  the  end 
of  the  Jewish  monarchy. 

Take  away  from  Genesis  the  belief  that  Moses  was  the 
author,  on  which  only  the  strange  belief  that  it  is  the  word 
of  God  has  stood,  and  there  remains  nothing  of  Genesis  but 
an  anonymous  book  of  stories,  fables,  and  traditionary  or 
invented  absurdities,  or  of  downright  lies.  The  story  of 
Eve  and  the  serpent,  and  of  Noah  and  his  ark,  drops  to  a 
level  with  the  Arabian  Tales,  without  the  merit  of  being 
entertaining ;  and  the  account  of  men  living  to  eight  and 
nine  hundred  years  becomes  as  fabulous  as  the  immortality 
of  the  giants  of  the  Mythology. 

Besides,  the  character  of  Moses,  as  stated  in  the  Bible, 
is  the  most  horrid  that  can  be  imagined.  If  those  accounts 
be  true,  he  was  the  wretch  that  first  began  and  carried  on 
wars  on  the  score,  or  on  the  pretence  of  religion ;  and  under 
that  mask,  or  that  infatuation,  committed  the  most  unex- 
ampled atrocities  that  are  to  be  found  in  the  history  ot  any 
nation,  of  which  I  will  state  only  one  instance. 

'When  the  Jewish  army  returned  from  one  of  their  mur- 
dering and  plundering  excursions,  the  account  goes  on  as 
follows  Numbers,  chap.  xxxi.  ver.  13. 

"  And  Moses,  and  Eleazer  the  priest,  and  all  the  princes 
of  the  congregation,  went  forth  to  meet  them  without  the 
camp ;  and  Moses  was  wroth  with  the  officers  of  the  host, 
with  the  captains  over  thousands,  and  captains  over  hun- 
dreds, which  came  from  the  battle ;  and  Moses  said  unto 
them,  JJcLve  ye  saved  all  the  women,  alive.?  behold,  thest 


PART  II.  J  THE   AGE    DF   SEASON.  7* 

caused  the  children  of  Israel,  through  the  council  of  Ba- 
laam, to  commit  trespass  against  the  Lord  in  the  matter  of 
Peor,  aid  there  was  a  plague  among  the  congregation  of 
the  Lord.  JSTow  therefore,  kUl  every  male  among  the  littU 
ones,  and  kill  every  woman  that  hath  known  a  man  by  lying 
with  him'  but  all  the  women-children  that  have  not  known 
a  man  by  lying  with  him  keep  alive  for  yourselves. 

Among  the  detestable  villains  that  in  any  period  of  the 
world  have  disgraced  the  name  of  man,  it  is  impossible  to 
find  a  greater  than  Moses,  if  this  account  be  true.  Here  is 
an  order  to  butcher  the  boys,  to  massacre  the  mothers,  and 
debauch  the  daughters. 

Let  any  mother  put  herself  in  the  situation  of  those 
mothers ;  one  child  murdered,  another  destined  to  violation, 
and  herself  in  the  hands  of  an  executioner;  let  any  daughter 
put  herself  in  the  situation  of  those  daughters,  destined  as 
a  prey  to  the  murderers  of  a  mother  and  a  brother,  and 
what  will  be  their  feelings  ?  It  is  in  vain  that  we  attempt 
to  impose  upon  nature,  for  nature  will  have  her  course,  and 
the  religion  that  tortures  all  her  social  ties  is  a  false  religion. 

After  this  detestable  order,  follows  an  account  of  the 
plunder  taken,  and  the  manner  of  dividing  it;  and  here  it 
is  that  the  profaneness  of  priestly  hypocrisy  increases  the 
catalogue  of  crimes.  Yerse  37,  "  And  the  Lord's  tribute 
of  the  sheep  was  six  hundred  and  threescore  and  fifteen ; 
and  the  beeves  was  thirty  and  six  thousand,  of  which  the 
Lord's  tribute  was  threescore  and  twelve;  and  the  asses 
were  thirty  thousand,  of  which  the  Lord's  tribute  was  three- 
score and  one ;  and  the  persons  were  thirty  thousand,  of 
which  the  Lord's  tribute  was  thirty  and  two."  In  short, 
the  matters  contained  in  this  chapter,  as  well  as  in  many 
other  parts  of  the  Bible,  are  too  horrid  for  humanity  to 
read,  or  for  decency  to  hear ;  for  it  appears,  from  the  35th 
verse  of  this  chapter,  that  the  number  of  women-children 
consigned  to  debauchery  by  the  order  of  Moses  was  thirty- 
two  thousand. 

People  in  general  know  not  what  wickedness  there  is  in 
this  pretended  word  of  God.  Brought  up  in  habits  of  su- 
perstition, they  take  it  for  granted  that  the  Bible  is  true, 
and  that  it  is  good ;  they  permit  themselves  not  to  doubt 
of  it,  and  they  carry  the  ideas  they  form  of  the  benevolence 
of  the  Almighty  to  the  book  which  they  have  been  taught 
to  believe  was  written  by  his  authority.  Good  heavens ' 
it  is  quite  another  thing ;  it  is  a  book  of  lioa,  wickcdncM, 


74  THE   AGE   OF   KEABON.  [PART  JO. 

and  blasphemy ;  for  what  can  be  greater  blasphemy,  than 
to  ascribe  the  wickedness  of  man  to  the  orders  of  the 
Almighty? 

But  to  return  to  my  subject,  that  of  showing  that  Moses 
is  not  the  author  of  the  books  ascribed  to  him,  and  that  the 
Bible  is  spurious.  The  two  instances  I  have  already  given 
would  be  sufficient,  without  any  additional  evidence,  to 
invalidate  the  authenticity  of  any  book  that  pretended  to 
be  four  or  five  hundred  years  more  ancient  than  the  matters 
it  speaks  of,  or  refers  to,  as  facts  ;  for  in  the  case  of  pursu- 
ing them  unto  Dan,  and  of  the  kings  that  reigned  over  the 
children  of  Israel,  not  even  the  flimsy  pretence  of  prophesy 
can  be  pleaded.  The  expressions  are  in  the  preter  tense, 
and  it  would  be  downright  idiotism  to  say  that  a  man  could 
prophesy  in  the  preter  tense. 

But  there  are  many  other  passages  scattered  throughout 
those  books  that  unite  in  the  same  point  of  evidence.  It  is 
said  in  Exodus,  (another  of  the  books  ascribed  to  Moses,) 
chap.  xvi.  verse  34,  "  And  the  children  of  Israel  did  eat 
manna  until  they  came  to  a  land  inhabited;  they  did  eat 
manna  until  they  came  unto  the  borders  of  the  land  of 
Canaan. 

Whether  the  children,  of  Israel  ate  manna  or  not,  or  what 
manna  was,  or  whether  it  was  any  thing  more  than  a  kind 
of  fungus  or  small  mushroom,  or  other  vegetable  substance 
common  to  that  part  of  the  country,  makes  nothing  to  my 
argument ;  all  that  I  mean  to  show  is,  that  it  is  not  Moses 
that  could  write  this  account,  because  the  account  extends 
itself  beyond  the  life  and  time  of  Moses.  Moses,  according 
to  the  Bible,  (but  it  is  such  a  book  of  lies  and  contradictions 
there  is  no  knowing  which  part  to  believe,  or  whether  any,) 
dies  in  the  wilderness,  and  never  came  upon  the  borders  of 
the  land  of  Canaan  ;  and,  consequently,  it  could  not  be  he 
that  said  what  the  children  of  Israel  did,  or  what  they  ate 
when  they  came  there.  This  account  of  eating  manna, 
which  they  tell  us  was  written  by  Moses,  extends  itself  to 
the  time  of  Joshua,  the  successor  of  Moses,  as  appears  by 
the  account  given  in  the  book  of  Joshua,  after  the  children 
of  Israel  had  passed  the  river  Jordan,  and  came  unto  the 
borders  of  the  land  of  Canaan.  Joshua,  chap.  v.  verse  12. 
"  And  the  manna  ceased  on  the  morrow,  after  they  had  eaten 
of  the  old  corn  of  the  land  /  neither  had  the  children  of 
Israel  manna  any  more,  but  they  did  eat  of  thv  fruit  oj  in* 
of  Canaan  that  year." 


II. J  THE   AGE    OF   REASON.  75 

But  a  more  remarkable  instance  than  this  occurs  in 
Deuteronomy ;  which,  while  it  shows  that  Moses  could  not 
be  the  writer  of  that  book,  shows  also  the  fabulous  notions 
that  prevailed  at  that  time  about  giants.  In  the  third  chap- 
ter of  Deuteronomy,  among  the  conquests  said  to  be  maae 
by  Moses,  is  an  account  of  the  taking  of  Og,  kin^  of 
Bashan,  ver.  11.  "  For  only  O<*,  king  of  Bashan,  remained 
of  the  race  of  giants ;  behold,  his  bedstead  was  a  bedstead 
of  iron ;  is  it  not  in  Rabbath  of  the  children  of  Ammon  ? 
nine  cubits  was  the  length  thereof,  and  four  cubits  the 
breadth  of  it,  after  the  cubit  of  a  man."  A  cubit  is  1  foot 
9  8881000ths  inches ;  the  length,  therefore,  of  the  bed  was  16 
feet  4  inches,  and  the  breadth  7  feet  4  inches ;  thus  much 
for  this  giant's  bed.  Now  for  the  historical  part,  which, 
though  the  evidence  is  not  so  direct  and  positive,  as  in  the 
former  cases,  it  is  nevertheless  very  presumable  and  cor- 
roborating evidence,  and  is  better  than  the  best  evidence  on 
the  contrary  side. 

The  writer,  by  way  of  proving  the  existence  of  this  giant, 
refers  to  his  bed,  as  an  ancient  relic,  and  says,  is  it  not  in 
Rabbath  (or  Rabbah)  of  the  children  of  Ammon  ?  meaning 
that  it  is ;  for  such  is  frequently  the  Bible  method  of  affirm- 
ing a  thing.  But  it  could  not  be  Moses  that  said  this,  be 
cause  Moses  could  know  nothing  about  Rabbah,  nor  of 
what  was  in  it.  Rabbah  was  not  a  city  belonging  to  this 
giant  king,  nor  was  it  one  of  the  cities  that  Moses  took. 
The  knowledge,  therefore,  that  this  bed  was  at  Rabbah, 
and  of  the  particulars  of  its  dimensions,  must  be  referred 
to  the  time  when  Rabbah  was  taken,  and  this  was  not  till 
four  hundred  years  after  the  death  of  Moses ;  for  which, 
see  2  Sam.  chap.  xii.  ver.  26.  "  And  Joab  (David's  general) 
fought  against  Rabbah  of  the  children  of  Amman,  and  toolc 
the  royal  city." 

As  I  am  not  undertaking  to  point  out  all  the  contradic- 
tions in  time,  place  and  circumstance,  that  abound  in  the 
books  ascribed  to  Moses,  and  which  prove  to  a  demonstra- 
tion that  those  books  could  not  be  written  by  Moses,  nor  in 
the  time  of  Moses :  I  proceed  to  the  book  of  Joshua,  and 
to  show  that  Joshua  is  not  the  author  of  that  book,  and 
that  it  is  anonymous  and  without  authority.  The  evidence 
I  shall  produce  is  contained  in  the  book  itself;  I  will  not 
go  out  of  the  Bible  for  proof  against  the  supposed  authen- 
ticity of  the  Bible.  False  testimony  is  always  good  against 


76  THE  AGE  OF  REASON.  PART  IL 

Joshua,  according  to  the  first  chapter  of  Joshua,  was  the 
immediate  successor  of  Moses ;  he  was,  moreover,  a  mili- 
tary man,  which  Moses  was  not,  and  he  continued  as  chief 
of  the  people  of  Israel  25  years ;  that  is,  from  the  time  that 
Moses  died,  which,  according  to  the  Bible  chronology,  wag 
1451  years  before  Christ,  until  1426  years  before  Christ, 
when,  according  to  the  same  chronology,  Joshua  died.  If, 
therefore,  we  find  in  this  book,  said  to  have  been  written 
by  Joshua,  reference  to  facts  done  after  the  death  of  Joshua, 
it  is  evidence  that  Joshua  could  not  be  the  author;  and  also 
that  the  book  could  not  have  been  written  till  after  the  time 
of  the  latest  fact  which  it  records.  As  to  the  character  of 
the  book,  it  is  horrid ;  it  is  a  military  history  of  rapine  and 
murder,  as  savage  and  brutal  as  those  recorded  of  his  pre- 
decessor in  villany  and  hypocrisy,  Moses;  and  the  blas- 
phemy consists,  as  in  the  former  books,  in  ascribing  those 
deeds  to  the  order  of  the  Almighty. 

In  the  first  place,  the  book  of  Joshua,  as  is  the  case  in 
the  preceding  books,  is  written  in  the  third  person ;  it  is 
the  historian  of  Joshua  that  speaks,  for  it  would  have  been 
absurd  and  vain-glorious  that  Joshua  should  say  of  himself, 
$6  is  said  of  him  in  the  last  verse  of  the  sixth  chapter,  that 
*l  his  fame  was  noised  throughout  all  the  country.  I  now 
come  more  immediately  to  the  proof. 

In  the  24th  chapter,  ver.  31,  it  is  said,  "that  Israel 
served  the  Lord  all  the  days  of  Joshua,  and  all  the  days  of 
the  elders  that  overlived  Joshua.'''  Now,  in  the  name  of 
common  sense,  can  it  be  Joshua  that  relates  what  people 
had  done  after  he  was  dead  ?  This  account  must  not  only 
have  been  written  by  some  historian  that  lived  after  Joshua, 
but  that  lived  also  after  the  elders  that  outlived  Joshua. 

There  are  several  passages  of  a  general  meaning  with 
respect  to  time,  scattered  throughout  the  book  of  Joshua, 
that  carries  the  time  in  which  the  book  was  written  to  a 
distance  from  the  time  of  Joshua,  but  without  marking  by 
exclusion  any  particular  time,  as  in  the  passage  above 
quoted.  In  that  passage,  the  time  that  intervened  between 
tne  death  of  Joshua  and  the  death  of  the  elders  is  excluded 
descriptively  and  absolutely,  and  the  evidence  substantiates 
that  the  book  could  not  have  been  written  till  after  the 
death  of  the  last. 

But  though  the  passages  to  which  I  allude,  and  which  I 
am  going  to  quote,  do  not  designate  any  particular  time  by 
exclusion,  they  imply  a  time  far  more  distant  from  the  daji 


PABT  II. J  THE   AOB   OF   BKASOR.  77 

of  Joshua,  than  is  contained  between  the  death  of  Joshua 
and  the  death  of  the  elders.  Such  is  the  passage,  chap.  x. 
ver.  14 ;  where,  after  giving  an  account  that  the  sun  stood 
still  upon  Gibeon,  and  the  moon  in  the  valley  of  Ajalon,  at 
the  command  of  Joshua,  (a  tale  only  fit  to  amuse  children) 
the  passage  says,  "  And  there  was  no  day  like  that,  before 
it,  nor  after  it,  that  the  Lord  hearkened  to  the  voice  of 
a  man." 

This  tale  of  the  sun  standing  still  upon  Mount  Gibeon, 
and  the  moon  in  the  valley  of  Ajalon,  is  one  of  those  fables 
that  detects  itself.  Such  a  circumstance  could  not  have 
happened  without  being  known  all  over  the  world.  One 
half  would  have  wondered  why  the  sun  did  not  rise,  and 
the  other  why  it  did  not  set ;  and  the  tradition  of  it  would 
be  universal,  whereas  there  is  not  a  nation  in  the  world  that 
knows  any  thing  about  it.  But  why  must  the  moon  stand 
still  ?  What  occasion  could  there  be  for  moonlight  in  the 
daytime,  and  that  too  while  the  sun  sinned  ?  As  a  poetical 
figure,  the  whole  is  well  enough  ;  it  is  akin  to  that  in  the 
song  of  Deborah  and  Baruk,  The  stars  in  their  courses 
fought  against  Sisera ;  but  it  is  inferior  to  the  figurative 
declaration  of  Mahomet  to  the  persons  who  came  to  expostu- 
late with  him  on  his  going  on,  Wert  thou,  said  he,  to  come 
to  me  with  the  sun  in  thy  right  hand  and  the  moon  in  thy 
left,  it  should  not  alter  my  career.  For  Joshua  to  have 
exceeded  Mahomet,  he  should  have  put  the  sun  and  moon 
one  in  each  pocket,  and  carried  them  as  Guy  Faux  carried 
his  dark  lantern,  and  taken  them  out  to  shine  as  he  might 
happen  to  want  them. 

The  sublime  and  the  ridiculous  are  often  so  nearly  re- 
lated that  it  is  difficult  to  class  them  separately.  One  step 
above  the  sublime  makes  the  ridiculous,  and  one  step 
above  the  ridiculous  makes  the  sublime  again ;  the  account, 
however,  abstracted  from  the  poetical  fancy,  shows  the  ig- 
norance of  Joshua,  for  he  should  have  commanded  the 
earth  to  have  stood  still. 

The  time  implied  by  the  expression  after  it,  that  is,  after 
that  day,  being  put  in  comparison  with  all  the  time  that 
passed  before  it,  must,  in  order  to  give  any  expressive  sig- 
nification to  the  passage,  mean  a  great  length  of  time : — for 
example,  it  would  have  been  "ridiculous  to  have  said  so  the 
next  day,  or  the  next  week,  or  the  next  month,  or  the  next 
year ;  to  give,  therefore,  meaning  to  the  passage,  compara- 
tive with  the  wonder  it  relates,  and  the  prior  time  it  alludei 


78  THE  AGK  OF  REASON.  [PART  IL 

to,  it  must  mean  centuries  of  years;  less,  luwever  than 
one  would  be  trifling,  and  less  than  two  would  be  barely 
admissible. 

A  distant,  but  general  time,  is  also  expressed  in  the  8th 
chapter ;  where,  after  giving  an  account  of  the  taking  the 
city  of  Ai,  it  is  said,  ver.  28th,  "  And  Joshua  burned  Ai, 
and  made  it  an  heap  for  ever,  a  desolation  unto  this  day :" 
and  again,  ver.  29,  where,  speaking  of  the  king  of  Ai, 
whom  Joshua  had  hanged,  and  buried  at  the  entering  of 
the  gate,  it  is  said,  "  And  he  raised  thereon  a  great  heap 
of  stones,  which  remaineth  unto  this  day,"  that  is,  unto  the 
day  or  time  in  which  the  writer  of  the  book  of  Joshua  lived. 
And  again,  in  the  10th  chapter,  where,  after  speaking  of 
the  five  kings  whom  Joshua  had  hanged  on  five  trees,  and 
then  thrown  in  a  cave,  it  is  said,  "  And  he  laid  great  stones 
on  the  cave's  mouth,  which  remain  unto  this  very  day." 

In  enumerating  the  -several  exploits  of  Joshua,  and  of 
the  tribes,  and  of  the  places  which  they  conquered  or  at- 
tempted, it  is  said,  c.  xv.  ver.  63,  "As  for  the  Jebusites, 
the  inhabitants  of  Jerusalem,  the  children  of  Judah  could 
not  drive  them  out;  but  the  Jebusites  dwell  with  the  chil- 
dren of  Judah  at  Jerusalem  unto  this  day."  The  question 
upon  this  passage  is,  at  what  time  did  the  Jebusites  and  the 
children  of  Judah  dwell  together  at  Jerusalem  ?  As  thi& 
matter  occurs  again  in  the  first  chapter  of  Judges,  I  shall 
reserve  my  observations  till  I  come  to  that  part. 

Having  thus  shown  from  the  book  of  Joshua  itself,  with- 
out any  auxiliary  evidence  whatever,  that  Joshua  is  not  the 
author  of  that  book,  and  that  it  is  anonymous,  and  conse- 
quently without  authority ;  I  proceed,  as  before-mentioned, 
to  the  book  of  Judges. 

The  book  of  Judges  is  anonymous  on  the  face  of  it ;  and, 
therefore,  even  the  pretence  is  wanting  to  call  it  the  word 
of  God ;  it  has  not  so  much  as  a  nominal  voucher ;  it  is  al- 
together fatherless. 

This  book  begins  with  the  same  expression  as  the  book 
of  Joshua.  That  of  Joshua  begins,  chap.  i.  ver.  1,  Now 
after  the  death  of  Moses,  &c.  and  this  of  the  Judges  begins, 
Now  after  the  death  of  Joshua,  &c.  This,  and  the  simi- 
larity of  style  between  the  two  books,  indicate  that  they 
are  the  work  of  the  same  author,  but  who  he  was,  is  alto 
gether  unknown :  the  only  point  that  the  book  proves  is, 
that  the  author  lived  long  after  the  time  of  Joshua ;  for 
though  it  begins  as  if  it  followed  immediately  after  his 


TAJtT  FJ.]  THE   AGE   OF   BEASON.  79 

death,  the  second  chapter  is  an  epitome  or  abstract  of  the 
whole  book,  which,  according  to  the  Bible  chronology,  ex. 
tends  its  history  through  a  space  of  306  years ;  tnat  is, 
from  the  death  of  Joshua,  1426  years  before  Christ,  to  the 
death  of  Sampson,  1120  years  before  Christ,  and  only  25 
years  before  Saul  went  to  seek  his  father's  asses,  and  was 
made  king.  But  there  is  good  reason  to  believe,  that  it 
was  not  written  till  the  time  of  David,  at  least,  and  that 
the  book  of  Joshua  was  not  written  before  the  same  time. 

In  the  first  chapter  of  Judges,  the  writer,  after  announc- 
ing the  death  of  Joshua,  proceeds  to  tell  what  happened 
between  the  children  of  Judah  and  the  native  inhabitants 
of  the  land  of  Canaan.  In  this  statement,  the  writer,  hav- 
ing abruptly  mentioned  Jerusalem  in  the  7th  verse,  says 
immediately  after,  in  the  8th  verse,  by  way  of  explanation, 
"  Now  the  children  of  Judah  had  fought  against  Jerusa- 
.em,  and  taken  it ;"  consequently  this  book  could  not  have 
been  written  before  Jerusalem  had  been  taken.  The  reader 
will  recollect  the  quotation  I  have  just  before  made  from 
the  15th  chapter  of  Joshua,  ver.  63,  where  it  said  that  the 
tfebusites  dwell  with  the  children  of  Judah  at  Jerusalem  at 
(his  day  /  meaning  the  time  when  the  book  of  Joshua  was 
written. 

The  evidence  I  "have  already  produced,  to  prove  that  the 
books  I  have  hitherto  treated  of  were  not  written  by  the 
persons  to  whom  they  are  ascribed,  nor  till  many  years 
after  their  death,  if  such  persons  ever  lived,  is  already  so 
abundant,  that  I  can  afford  to  admit  this  passage  with  less 
weight  than  I  am  entitled  to  draw  from  it.  For  the  case 
is,  that  so  far  as  the  Bible  can  be  credited  as  an  history,  the 
city  of  Jerusalem  was  hot  taken  till  the  time  of  David  ; 
and,  consequently,  the  books  of  Joshua,  and  of  Judges, 
were  not  written  till  after  the  commencement  of  the  reign 
of  David,  which  was  370  years  after  the  death  of  Joshua. 

The  name  of  the  city,  that  was  afterwards  called  Jeru- 
salem, was  originally  Jebus,  or  Jebusi,  and  was  the  capital 
of  the  Jebusites.  The  account  of  David's  taking  this  city  is 
given  in  2  Samuel,  chapter  v.  ver.  4,  &c. ;  also  in  1  Chron. 
chap.  xiv.  ver.  4,  &c.  There  is  no  mention  in  any  part  of 
the  Bible  that  it  was  ever  taken  before,  nor  any  account 
that  favors  such  an  opinion.  It  is  said,  either  in  Samuel  or 
in  Chronicles,  that  they  utterly  destroyed  men,  women  and 
children  ;  that  they  left  not  a  situl  to  breathe,  as  is  said  of 
their  other  conquests ;  and  the  silence  here  observed  itn- 


•80  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  [PART  D 

plies  that  it  was  taken  by  capitulation  and  that  the  Jebu- 
sites,  the  native  inhabitants,  continued  to  live  in  the  place 
after  it  was  taken.  The  account,  therefore,  given  in  Joshua, 
that  the  Jebusites  dwell  with  the  children  of  Judah  at  Jerusa- 
lem at  this  day,  corresponds  to  no  other  time  than  after  the 
taking  the  city  by  David. 

Having  now  shown  that  every  book  in  the  Bible>  from 
Genesis  to  Judges,  is  without  authenticity,  I  come  to.  the 
book  of  Ruth,  an  idle,  bungling  story,  foolishly  told,  no- 
body knows  by  whom,  about  a  strolling  country -girl  creep- 
ing slyly  to  bed  to  her  cousin  Boaz.  Pretty  stuff  indeed 
to  be  called  the  word  of  God !  It  is,  however,  one  of  the 
best  books  in  the  Bible,  for  it  is.  free  from  murder  and 
rapine. 

I  come  next  to  the  two  books  of  Samuel,  and  to  show 
that  those  books  were  not  written  by  Samuel,  nor  till  a 
great  length  of  time  after  the  death  of  Samuel ;  and  that 
they  are,  like  all  the  former  books,  anonymous  and  without 
authority. 

To  be  convinced  that  these  books  have  been  written 
much  later  than  the  time  of  Samuel,  and,  consequently,  not 
by  him,  it  is  only  necessary  to  read  the  account  which  the 
writer  gives  of  £aul  going  to  seek  his  father's  asses,  and  of 
his  interview  with  Samuel,  of  whom  Saul  went  to  inquire 
about  those  lost  asses,  as  foolish  people  now-a-days  go  to  a 
conjuror  to  inquire  after  lost  things. 

The  writer,  in  relating  this  story  of  Saul,  Samuel,  and 
the  asses,  does  not  tell  it  as  a  thing  that  had  just  then  hap- 
pened, but  as  an  ancient  story  in  the  time  this  writer  lived  / 
for  he  tells  it  in  the  language  or  terms  used  at  the  time  that 
Samuel  lived,  which  obliges  the  writer  to  explain  the  story 
in  the  terms  or  language  used  in  the  time  the  writer  lived. 

Samuel,  in  the  account  given  of  him,  in  the  first  of  those 
books,  chap.  ix.  is  called  the  seer ;  and  it  is  by  this  term 
that  Saul  inquires  after  him,  ver.  11,  "  And  as  they  (Saul 
and  his  servant)  went  up  the  hill  to  the  city,  they  found 
young  maidens  going  out  to  draw  water ;  and  they  said 
unto  them.  Is  the  seer  here  ?"  Saul  then  went  according 
to  the  direction  of  these  maidens,  and  met  Samuel  without 
knowing  him,  and  said  unto  him,  ver.  18,  "  Tell  me,  I  pray 
thee,  where  the  seer's  house  is  f  and  Samuel  answered  Saul, 
and  said,  I  am  the  seer" 

As  the  wri'ter  of  the  book  of  Samuel  relates  these  ques- 
tions and  answers,  in  the  language  or  manner  of  speaking 


PABTT  n.]  THE   AQB   OF   REASON.  81 

used  iu  the  time  they  are  said  to  have  been  spoken ;  and 
as  that  manner  of  speaking  was  out  of  use  when  this 
author  wrote,  he  found  it  necessary,  in  order  to  make  the 
story  understood,  to  explain  the  terms  in  which  these  que& 
tions  and  answers  are  spoken  ;  and  he  does  this  in  the  9th 
verse,  where  he  says,  "before-time,  in  Israel,  when  a  man  went 
to  inquire  of  God,  thus  ne  spake,  Come,  let  us  go  to  the  seer ; 
for  he  that  is  now  called  a  prophet,  was  before-time  called  a 
seer."  This  proves,  as  I  have  before  said,  that  this  story  of 
Saul,  Samuel  and  the  asses,  was  an  ancient  story  at  the  time 
the  book  of  Samuel  was  written,  and  consequently  Samuel 
did  not  write  if,  and  that  that  book  is  without  authenticity. 

But  if  we  go  further  into  those  books  the  evidence  is 
still  more  positive  that  Samuel  is  not  the  writer  of  them  : 
for  they  relate  things  that  did  not  happen  till  several  years 
after  the  death  of  Samuel.  Samuel  died  before  Saul ;  for  the 
1st  Samuel,  chap,  xxviii.  tells,  that  Saul,  and  the  witch  of 
Endor  conjured  Samuel  up  after  he  was  dead ;  yet  the  his- 
tory of  the  matters  contained  in  those  books  is  extended 
through  the  remaining  part  of  Saul's  life,  and  to  the  latter 
end  ot  the  life  of  David,  who  succeeded  Saul.  The  account 
of  the  death  and  burial  of  Samuel  (a  thing  which  he  could 
not  write  himself)  is  related  in  the  25th  chapter  of  the  first 
book  of  Samuel ;  and  the  chronology  affixed  to  this  chapter 
makes  this  to  be  1060  years  before  Christ ;  yet  the  history 
of  this  first  book  is  brought  down  to  1056  years  before 
Christ ;  that  is,  till  the  death  of  Saul,  which '  was  not  till 
four  years  after  the  death  of  Samuel. 

The  second  book  of  Samuel  begins  with  an  account  of 
things  that  did  not  happen  till  four  years  after  Samuel  was 
dead  ;  for  it  begins  with  the  reign  of  David,  who  succeeded 
Saul,  and  it  goes  on  to  the  end  of  David's  reign,  which  was 
forty -three  years  after  the  death  of  Samuel ;  and,  therefore, 
the  books  are  in  themselves  positive  evidence  that  they 
were  not  written  by  Samuel. 

I  have  now  gone  through  all  the  books  in  the  first  part 
of  the  Bible,  to  which  the  names  of  persons  are  affixed,  as 
being  the  authors  of  those  books,  and  which  the  church, 
styling  itself  the  Christian  church,  have  imposed  upon  the 
world  as  the  writings  of  Moses,  Joshua  and  Samuel ;  and 
I  have  detected  and  proved  the  falsehood  of  this  imposi 
tion.  And  now,  ye  priests,  of  every  description,  who  have 
preached  and  written  against  the  former  part  of  the  Ag« 
of  Reason*  what  have  ye  to  say  ?  Will  ye,  with  all  this 
6 


88  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  [PAST  tt 

mass  of  evidence  against  you,  and  staring  you  in  the  face, 
still  have  the  assurance  to  march  into  your  pulpits,  and 
continue  to  impose  these  books  on  your  congregations,  as 
the  works  of  inspired  penmen,  and  the  word  of  God,  when 
it  is  as  evident  as  demonstration  can  make  truth  appear, 
that  the  persons  who,  ye  say,  are  the  authors,  are  not  the 
authors,  and  that  ye  know  not  who  the  authors  are.  What 
shadow  of  pretence  have  ye  now  to  produce  for  continuing 
the  blasphemous  fraud  ?  What  have  ye  still  to  offer  against 
the  pure  and  moral  religion  of  Deism,  in  support  of  your 
system  of  falsehood,  idolatry  and  pretended  revelation? 
Had  the  cruel  and  murderous  orders,  with  which  the  Bible 
is  filled,  and  the  numberless  torturing  executions  of  men, 
women,  and  children,  in  consequence  of  those  orders,  been 
ascribed  to  some  friend,  whose  memory  you  revered,  you 
would  have  glowed  with  satisfaction  at  detecting  the  false- 
hood of  the  charge,  and  gloried  in  defending  his  injured 
fame.  It  is  because  ye  are  stmk  in  the  cruelty  of  super- 
stition, or  feel  no  interest  in  the  honor  of  your  Creator,  that 
ye  listen  to  the  horrid  tales  of  the  Bible,  or  hear  them  with 
callous  indifference.  The  evidence  I  have  produced,  and 
shall  still  produce  in  the  course  of  this  work,  to  prove  that 
the  Bible  is  without  authority,  will,  whilst  it  wounds  the 
stubbornness  of  a  priest,  relieve  and  tranquilize  the  minds 
of  millions ;  it  will  free  them  from  all  those  hard  thoughts 
of  the  Almighty  which  priestcraft  and  the  Bible  had  in- 
fused into  their  minds,  and  which  stood  in  everlasting  op- 
position to  all  their  ideas  of  his  moral  justice  and  benevo- 
lence. 

I  come  now  to  the  two  books  of  Kings,  and  the  two 
books  of  Chronicles.  Those  books  are  altogether  historical, 
and  are  chiefly  confined  to  the  lives  and  actions  of  the 
Jewish  kings,  who  in  general  were  a  parcel  of  rascals ;  but 
these  are  matters  with  which  we  have  no  more  concern, 
than  we  have  with  the  Roman  emperors,  or  Homer's  account 
of  the  Trojan  war.  Besides  which,  as  those  works  are 
anonymous,  and  as  we  know  nothing  of  the  writer,  or  of 
his  character,  it  is  impossible  for  us  to  know  what  degree 
of  credit  to  give  to  the  matters  related  therein.  Like 
all  other  ancient  histories,  they  appear  to  be  a  jumble  of 
fable  and  of  fact,  and  of  probable  and  of  improbable 
things ;  but  which,  distance  of  time  and  place,  and  change 
of  circumstances  in  the  world,  have  rendered  obsolete  and 
tminteresting. 


PAKT  n.J  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  88 

The  chief  use  I  shall  make  of  those  books,  will  be  that 
of  comparing  them  with  each  other,  and  with  other  parts 
of  the  Bible,  to  show  the  confusion,  contradiction,  and 
cruelty  in  this  pretended  word  of  God. 

The  first  book  of  Kings  begins  with  the  reign  of  Solo- 
mon, which,  according  to  the  Bible  Chronology,  was  1015 
years  before  Christ ;  and  the  second  book  ends  588  years 
before  Christ,  being  a  little  after  the  reign  of  Zedekiah, 
whom  Nebuchadnezzar,  after  taking  Jerusalem  and  con- 
quering the  Jews,  carried  captive  to  Babylon.  The  two 
books  include  a  space  of  427  years. 

The  two  books  of  Chronicles  are  a  history  of  the  same 
times,  and  in  general  of  the  same  persons,  by  another 
author ;  for  it  would  be  absurd  to  suppose  that  the 
same  author  wrote  the  history  twice  over.  The  first 
book  of  Chronicles  (after  giving  the  genealogy  from 
Adam  to  Saul,  which  takes  up  the  first  nine  chapters) 
begins  with  the  reign  of  David ;  and  the  last  book  ends 
as  in  the  last  book  of  Kings,  soon  after  the  reign  of  Zede- 
kiah, about  588  years  before  Christ.  The  two  last  verses 
of  the  last  chapter  bring  the  history  52  years  more  forward, 
that  is,  to  536.  But  these  verses  do  not  belong  to  the 
book,  as  I  shall  show  when  I  come  to  speak  of  the  book  of 
Ezra. 

The  two  books  of  Kings,  besides  the  history  of  Saul, 
David  and  Solomon,  who  reigned  over  all  Israel,  contain 
an  abstract  of  the  lives  of  seventeen  kings  and  one  queen, 
who  are  styled  kings  of  Judah,  and  of  nineteen,  who  are 
etyled  kings  of  Israel ;  for  the  Jewish  nation,  immediately 
on  the  death  of  Solomon,  split  into  two  parties,  who  chose 
separate  kings,  and  who  carried  on  most  rancorous  wars 
against  each  other. 

Those  two  books  are  little  more  than  a  history  of  assas- 
sinations, treachery  and  wars.  The  cruelties  that  the  Jews 
had  accustomed  themselves  to  practise  on  the  Canaanites, 
whose  country  they  had  savagely  invaded  under  a  pre- 
tended gift  from  God,  they  afterwards  practised  as  furiously 
on  each  other.  Scarcely  half  their  kings  died  a  natural 
death,  and,  in  some  instances,  whole  families  were  de- 
stroyed to  secure  possession  to  the  successor,  who,  after  a 
few  years,  and  sometimes  only  a  few  months,  or  less, 
shared  the  same  fate.  In  the  tenth  chapter  of  the  second 
book  of  Kings,  an  account  is  given  of  two  baskets  full  of 
children's  heads,  seventy  in  number,  being  exposed  at  the 


04  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  \PAKT  A 

entrance  of  the  citj ;  they  were  the  children  of  Ahab,  and 
were  murdered  by  the  orders  of  Jehu,  whom  Elisha,  the 
pretended  man  of  God,  had  anointed  to  be  king  over 
Israel,  on  purpose  to  commit  this  bloody  deed,  and  assassi- 
nate his  predecessor.  And  in  the  account  of  the  reign  of 
Manaham,  one  of  the  kings  of  Israel  who  had  murdered 
Shallurn,  who  had  reigned  but  one  month,  it  is  said, 
Kings,  chap.  xv.  ver.  16,  that  Manaham  smote  the  city  of 
Tiphsah,  because  they  opened  not  the  city  to  him,  and  all 
the  women  that  were  therein  that  were  with  child  they  ripped 

UP- 

Could  we  permit  ourselves  to  suppose  that  the  Almighty 

would  distinguish  any  nation  of  people  by  the  name  of  Sis 
chosen  people,  we  must  suppose  that  people  to  have  been 
an  example  to  all  the  rest  of  the  world  of  the  purest  piety 
and  humanity,  and  not  such  a  nation  of  ruffians  and  cut- 
throats as  the  ancient  Jews  were ;  a  people,  who,  corrupted 
by,  and  copying  after  such  monsters  and  imposters  as  Moses 
and  Aaron,  Joshua,  Samuel,  and  David,  had  distinguished 
themselves  above  all  others,  on  the  face  of  the  known  earth, 
for  barbarity  and  wickedness.  If  we  will  not  stubbornly 
shut  our  eyes,  and  steel  our  hearts,  it  is  impossible  not 
to  see,  in  spite  of  all  that  long-established  superstition 
imposes  upon  the  mind,  that  that  flattering  appellation 
of  His  chosen  people  is  no  other  than  a  lie  the  priests  and 
leaders  of  the  Jews  had  invented,  to  cover  the  baseness  of 
their  own  characters ;  and  which  Christian  priests,  some- 
times as  corrupt,  and  often  as  cruel,  have  professed  to  be- 
lieve. 

The  two  books  of  Chronicles  are  a  repetition  of  the  same 
crimes  ;  but  the  history  is  broken  in  several  places,  by  the 
author  leaving  out  the  reign  of  some  of  rb.eir  kings ;  and 
in  this,  as  well  as  in  that  of  Kings,  there  16  such  a  frequent 
transition  from  kings  of  Judah  to  kings  of  Israel,  and  from 
kings  of  Israel  to  kings  of  Judah,  that  the  narrative  is  ob- 
scure in  the  reading.  In  the  same  book  the  history  some- 
times contradicts  itself;  for  example,  in  the  second  book 
of  Kings,  chap.  i.  ver.  8,  we  are  told,  but  in  rather  ambigu- 
ous terms,  that  after  die  death  of  Ahaziah,  king  of  Israel, 
Jehoram,  or  Jorain,  (who  was  of  the  house  of  Ahab,) 
reigned  in  his  scead  in  the  second  year  of  Jehoram,  or 
Joram,  son  ot  Jehoshaphat,  king  of  J  udah ;  and  in  chap, 
viii.  ver.  16,  of  the  same  book,  it  is  said,  and  in  the  fifth 
year  of  Joram,  the  son  of  Ahab,  king  of  Israel,  Jehosha- 


purr  n.]  THE  AGE  OF  REASON.  85 

phat  being  then  king  of  Judah,  began  to  reign ;  that  ig, 
one  chapter  says  Jorani  of  Judah  oegan  to  reign  in  the 
second  year  of  Joram  of  Israel ;  and  the  other  chapter  says, 
that  Joram  of  Israel  began  to  reign  in  the  fifth  year  of 
Joram  of  Judah. 

Several  of  the  most  extraordinary  matters  related  in  one 
history,  as  having  happened  during  the  reign  of  such  and 
«mch  of  their  kings,  are  not  to  be  found  in  the  other,  in 
relating  the  reign  of  the  same  king  ;  for  example,  the  two 
first  rival  kings,  after  the  death  of  Solomon,  were  Reho- 
boara  and  Jeroboam  ;  and  in  1  Kings,  chap.  xii.  and  xiii., 
an  account  is  given  of  Jeroboam  making  an  offering  of 
burnt  incense,  and  that  a  man  who  is  there  called  a  man 
of  God,  cried  out  against  the  altar,  chap.  xiii.  ver.  2  :  "  O 
altar !  altar !  thus  saith  the  Lord  ;  Beho  d,  a  child  shall  be 
born  to  the  house  of  David,  Josiah  by  name,  and  upon  thee 
shall  he  offer  the  priests  of  the  high  places,  and  burn  in- 
cense upon  thee,  and  men's  bones  shall  be  burnt  upon 
thee."  verse  3  :  "And  it  came  to  pass,  when  king  Jero- 
boam heard  the  saying  of  the  man  of  God,  which  had  cried 
against  the  altar  in  Bethel,  that  he  put  forth  his  hand  from 
the  altar,  saying  :  Lay  hold  on  him  •  and  his  hand  which 
he  put  out  against  him  dried  up,  so  that  he  could  not  pull 
it  again  to  h^m" 

One  would  think  that  such  an  extraordinary  case  as 
this,  (which  is  spoken  of  as  a  judgment,)  happening  to  the 
chief  of  one  of  the  parties,  and  that  at  me  first  moment  of 
the  separation  of  the  Israelites  into  two  nations,  would,  if  it 
had  been  true,  have  been  recorded  in  both  histories.  But 
though  men,  in  latter  times,  have  believed  att  that  the 
prophets  have  said  unto  them,  it  does  not  appear  these 
prophets  or  historians  believed  each  other,  they  knew  each 
other  too  well. 

A  long  account  also  is  given  in  Kings  about  Elijah. 
It  runs  through  several  cnapters,  and  concludes  with 
telling,  2  Kings,  chap.  ii.  ver.  11,  "  And  it  came  to 
pass,  as  they  (Elijah  and  Elisha)  still  went  on,  and 
talked,  that,  behold,  there  appeared  a  chariot  of  for* 
and  horses  of  jvre,  and  parted  them  both  asunder,  and 
Elijah  went  up  by  a  whirlwind  into  heaven."  Hum  1  this 
the  author  of  Chronicles,  miraculous  as  the  story  is,  makes 
no  mention  of,  though  he  mentions  Elijah  by  name  ; 
neither  does  he  say  any  thing  of  the  story  related  in 
the  second  chapter  of  the  same  book  of  Kings,  of  a 


86  THE  AGE  OF  REASON.  [PABT  H. 

parcel  of  children  calling  Elisha  laid  head,  bald  head  ; 
and  that  this  man  of  @od,  ver.  24,  "turned  back,  ana 
looked  upon  them,  and  cursed  them  in  the  name  of  the 
Lord  j  and  there  came  forth  two  she  bears  out  of  the 
wood,  and  tore  forty  and  two  children  of  them."  He 
also  passes  over  in  silence  the  story  told,  2  Kings,  chap 
xiii.,  that  when  they  were  burying  a  man  in  the  sepulchre, 
where  Elisha  had  been  buried,  it  happened  that  tne  dead 
man,  as  they  were  letting  him  down,  (ver.  21,)  "  touched 
the  bones  of  Elisha,  and  he  (the  dead  man)  revived,  and 
stood  upon  his  feet."  The  story  does  not  tell  us  whether 
they  buried  the  man  notwithstanding  he  revived  and  stood 
upon  his  feet,  or  drew  him  up  again.  Upon  all  these 
stories,  the  writer  of  Chronicles  is  as  silent  as  any  writer 
of  the  present  day,  who  did  not  choose  to  be  accused  of 
lying,  or  at  least  of  romancing,  would  be  about  stories  of 
tne  same  kind. 

But,  however  these  two  historians  may  differ  from  each 
other,  with  respect  to  the  tales  related  by  either,  they  are 
silent  alike  with  respect  to  those  men  styled  prophets, 
whose  writings  fill  up  the  latter  part  of  the  Bible.  Isaiah, 
who  lived  in  the  time  of  Hezekiah,  is  mentioned  in  Kings, 
and  again  in  Chronicles,  when  these  historians  are  speaking 
of  that  reign  ;  but  except  in  one  or  two  instances  at  most, 
and  those  very  slightly,  none  of  the  rest  are  so  much  as 
spoken  of,  or  even  hinted  at;  though,  according  to  the 
Bible  chronology,  they  lived  within  the  time  those  his- 
tories were  written  ;  some  of  them  long  before.  If 
those  prophets,  as  they  are  called,  were  men  of  such 
importance  in  their  day,  as  the  compilers  of  the  Bible, 
and  priests  and  commentators  have  since  represented  them 
to  be,  how  can  it  be  accounted  for,  that  not  one  of  these 
histories  should  say  any  thing  about  them  ? 

The  history  in  the  books  of  Kings  and  of  Chronicles  is 
brought  forward,  as  I  have  already  said,  to  the  year  588  be- 
fore Christ ;  it  will,  therefore,  be  proper  to  examine  which 
of  these  prophets  lived  before  that  period. 

Here  follows  a  table  of  all  the  prophets,  with  the  times 
in  which  they  lived  before  Christ,  according  to  the  chro- 
nology affixed  to  the  first  chapter  of  each  of  the  book&  of  the 
prophets;  and  also  of  the  number  of  years  thejr  lived  he- 
fore  the  books  of  Kings  and  Chronicles  w«w*  written. 


TABT  H.] 


THE  AGB   OF   REA80W. 


87 


Table  of  the  Prophets,  with  the  time  in  which  .hey  lived  before 
Christ,  and  also  before  the  books  of  Kings  and  Chtoniclet 
were  written. 


Names. 

Years 
before 
Christ 

Yrs.  before 
Kings  and 
Chronicles. 

Observations. 

Isaiah 

760 

172 

mentioned. 

Jeremiah     - 

629 

41 

(  mentioned   only  in   th« 
(  last  chap,  of  Chron. 

Ezekiel 

595 

7 

not  mentioned. 

Daniel 

607 

19 

not  mentioned. 

Hosea 

785 

9f 

not  mentioned. 

Joel 

800 

212 

not  mentioned. 

Amos 

78» 

199 

not  mentioned. 

Obadiah 

789 

199 

not  mentioned. 

Jonah 

862 

274 

see  the  note.* 

Micah 

750 

162 

not  mentioned. 

Nahum 

713 

126 

not  mentioned. 

Habakkuk 

620 

38 

not  mentioned. 

Zephaniah 

630 

42 

not  mentioned. 

Haggai     )    ftfter  the 
Zacharia  [   a 

Malachi    )    year688 

This  table  is  either  not  very  honorable  for  the  Bible  his- 
torians, or  not  very  honorable  for  the  Bible  prophets  ;  and 
I  leave  to  priests,  and  commentators,  who  are  very  learned 
in  little  things,  to  settle  the  point  of  etiquette  between  the 
two ;  and  to  assign  a  reason,  why  the  authors  of  Kings  and 
Chronicles  have  treated  those  prophets,  whom  in  the  former 
part  of  the  Age  of  Reason,  I  have  considered  as  poets,  with 
as  much  degrading  silence  as  any  historian  of  the  present 
day  would  treat  Peter  Pindar. 

I  have  one  observation  more  to  nvo-ke  on  the  book  of 
Chronicles ;  after  which  1  shall  pass  w  to  review  the  re- 
maining books  of  the  Bible. 

In  my  observations  on  the  book  ot  Genesis,  I  have 
quoted  a  passage  from  the  36th  chapter,  verse  31,  which 
evidently  refers  to  a  time,  after  that  kings  began  to  reign 
over  the  children  of  Israel ;  and  I  have  shown  that  as  thi* 
verse  is  verbatim  the  same  as  in  Chronicles,  chap.  i.  verse 
43,  where  it  stands  consistently  with  the  order  of  history, 
which  in  Genesis  it  does  not,  that  the  verse  in  Genesis,  and 

*  In  2  Kings,  chap.  xiv.  ver.  25,  the  name  of  Jonah  is  mentioned  on  ac- 
count of  the  restoration  of  a  tract  of  land  by  Jeroboam;  but  nothing  farther 
la  said  of  him,  nor  is  any  allusion  made  to  the  book  of  J<*nah,  nor  to  hit  ft* 
peditiou  to  Ninevah,  nor  to  his  encounter  with  the  whala. 


§g  THE    AGE   OF   SEASON".  [PART  EL 

a  great  part  of  the  36th  chapter,  have  been  tajten  from 
Chronicles;  and  that  the  book  of  Genesis,  though  it  is 
placed  first  in  the  Bible,  and  ascribed  to  Moses,  has  been 
manufactured  by  some  unknown  person,  after  the  book  of 
Chronicles  was  written,  which  was  not  until  at  least  eight 
hundred  and  sixty  years  after  the  time  of  Moses. 

The  evidence  I  proceed  by  to  substantiate  this  is  regular, 
and  has  in  it  but  two  stages.  First,  as  I  have  already 
stated,  that  the  passage  in  Genesis  refers  itself  for  time  to 
Chronicles ;  secondly,  that  the  book  of  Chronicles,  to  which 
this  passage  refers  itself,  was  not  begun  to  be  written  until 
at  least  eight  hundred  and  sixty  years  after  the  time  of 
Moses.  To  prove  this,  we  have  only  to  look  into  the  thir- 
teenth verse  of  the  third  chapter  of  the  first  book  of  Chron- 
icles, where  the  writer,  in  giving  the  genealogy  of  tho 
descendants  of  David,  mentions  Zedekiah ;  and  it  was  in 
the  time  of  Zedekiah,  that  Nebuchadnezzar  conquered  Jeru- 
salem, 588  years  before  Christ,  and  consequently  more  than 
860  years  after  Moses.  Those  who  have  superstitiously 
boasted  of  the  antiquity  of  the  Bible,  and  particularly  of 
the  books  ascribed  to  Moses,  have  done  it  without  examin 
ation,  and  without  any  authority  than  that  of  one  credu- 
lous man  telling  it  to  another ;  for,  so  far  as  historical  and 
chronological  evidence  applies,  the  very  first  book  in  the 
Bible  is  not  so  ancient  as  the  book  of  Homer,  by  more  than 
three  hundred  years,  and  is  about  the  same  age  with  ^Esop's 
Fables. 

I  am  not  contending  for  the  morality  of  Homer ;  on  the 
contrary,  I  think  it  a  book  of  false  glory  ;  tending  to  inspire 
immoral  and  mischievous  notions  of  honor:  and  with  respect 
to  ^Esop,  though  the  moral  is  in  general  just,  the  fable  is 
often  cruel ;  and  the  cruelty  of  the  fable  does  more  injury  to 
the  heart,  especially  in  a  child,  than  the  moral  does  good 
to  the  judgment. 

Having  now  dismissed  Kings  and  Chronicles,  I  come  to 
the  next  in  course,  the  book  of  Ezra. 

As  one  proof,  among  others,  I  shall  produce,  to  show 
the  disorder  in  which  this  pretended  word  of  God,  the 
Bible,  has  been  put  together,  and  the  uncertainty  of  who 
the  authors  were,  we  have  only  to  look  at  the  three  first 
verses  in  Ezra,  and  the  two  last  in  Chronicles ;  for  oy  what 
kind  of  cutting  and  shuffling  has  it  been  that  the  three 
first  verses  in  Ezra  should  be  the  two  last  verses  in  Chron- 
icles, or  that  the  vv^o  last  in  Chronicles  should  be  the  three 


PART  II.]  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  89 

first  in  Ezra  ?    Either  the  authors  did  not  Know  their  OWD 
works,  or  the  compilers  did  not  know  the  authors. 

Twolast  Verses  of  Chronicles.      Three  ford  Verses  of  Ezra. 

Yer.  22.  Now  in  the  first  Yer.  1.  Now  in  the  first 
year  of  Cyrus,  king  of  Persia,  year  of  Cyrus,  king  of  Per- 
that  the  word  of  the  Lord,  sia,  that  the  wora  of  the 
spoken  by  the  mouth  of  Jere-  Lord,  by  the  mouth  of  Jere- 
iniah,  might  be  accomplish-  miah,  might  be  fulfilled,  the 
ed,  the  Lord  stirred  up  the  Lord  stirred  up  the  spirit 
spirit  of  Cyrus,  king  of  Per-  of  Cyrus,  king  of  Persia, 
sia,  that  he  made  a  proclama-  that  he  made  a  proclama- 
tion throughout  all  his  king-  tion  throughout  all  his  king- 
dom, and  put  it  also  in  writ-  dom,  and  put  it  also  in  writ- 
ing,  saying,  ing,  saying, 

23.  Thus  saith  Cyrus,  king  2.  Thus  saith  Cyrus,  king 
of  Persia,  all  the  kingdoms  of  Persia,  The  Lord  God  of 
of  the  earth  hath  the  Lord  heaven  hath  given  me  all 
God  of  heaven  given  me ;  the  kingdoms  of  the  earth ; 
and  he  hath  charged  me  to  and  he  hath  charged  me  tc 
build  him  an  house  in  Jeru-  build  him  an  house  at  Jeru- 
salem which  is  in  Judah.  salem,  which  is  in  Judah. 
Who  is  there  among  you  of  3.  Who  is  there  among  you 
his  people  ?  the  Lord  his  God  of  all  his  people  ?  his  Goa  be 
be  with  him,  and  let  him  with  him,  and  let  him  go  up, 
go  tp.  to  Jerusalem,  which  is  in  Jit- 

dah)  and  build  the  house  of 
the  Lord  God  of  Israel  (M 
is  the  God)  which  is  in  Jeru 
salem. 

The  last  verse  in  Chronicles  is  broken  abruptly,  ana 
ands  in  the  middle  of  the  phrase  with  the  word  up,  without 
signifying  to  what  place.  This  abrupt  break,  and  the  ap- 
pearance of  the  same  verses  in  the  different  books,  show, 
as  I  have  already  said,  the  disorder  and  ignorance  in  which 
the  Bible  has  been  put  together,  and  that  the  compilers  of 
it  had  no  authority  for  what  they  were  doing,  no?  we  any 
authority  for  believing  what  they  have  done.* 

*  I  observed,  as  1  passed  along,  several  broken  and  senseless  passages  in 
the  Bible,  without  thinking  them  of  consequence  enough  to  V«  introduced 
in  the  body  of  the  •work;  such  as  that,  1  Samuel,  chap.  xiiL  ver.  1,  where  it 
Is  said,  "  Saul  reigned  one  year ;  and  when  he  had  reigned  two  years  over 
brael,  Saul  chose  him  three  thousand  men,"  Ac.  The  ti rr  part  cf  the  verse 


90  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  [PAKT  tt 

The  only  thing  that  has  any  appearance  cf  certainty  in 
the  book  of  Ezra,  is  the  time  in  which  it  was  written,  which 
was  immediately  after  the  return  of  the  Jews  from  the 
Babylonian  captivity,  about  536  years  before  Christ.  Ezra 
(who,  according  to  the  Jewish  commentators,  is  the  same 
person  as  is  called  Esdras  in  the  Apocrypha)  was  one  of  the 
persons  who  returned,  and  who,  it  is  probable,  wrote  the 
account  of  that  affair.  Nehemiah,  whose  book  follows  next 
to  Ezra,  was  another  of  the  returned  persons ;  "and  who,  it 
is  also  probable,  wrote  the  account  of  the  same  affair,  in 
the  book  that  bears  his  name.  But  those  accounts  are 
nothing  to  us,  nor  to  any  other  persons,  unless  it  be  to  the 
Jews,  as  a  part  of  the  history  of  their  nation ;  and  there  is 
just  as  much  of  the  word  of  God  in  those  books  as  there  is 
in  any  of  the  histories  of  France,  or  Rapin's  history  of 
England,  or  the  history  of  any  other  country. 

But  even  in  matters  of  historical  record,  neither  of  those 
writers  are  to  be  depended  upon.  In  the  second  chapter 

that  Saul  reigned  one  year  has  no  sense,  since  it  does  not  tell  us  -what  Sao, 
did,  nor  say  any  thing  of  what  happened  at  the  end  of  that  one  year ;  and  it 
is,  besides,  mere  absurdity  to  say  he  reigned  one  year,  when  the  very  next 
phrase  says  he  had  reigned  two ;  for  if  he  had  reigned  two,  it  was  impossi- 
ble not  to  have  reigned  one. 

Another  instance  occurs  in  Joshua,  chap.  v.  where  the  writer  tells  us  a 
story  of  an  angel  (for  such  the  table  of  contents  at  the  head  of  the  chapter 
calls  him)  appearing  unto  Joshua;  and  the  story  ends  abruptly,  and  with- 
out any  conclusion.  The  story  is  as  follows: — Ver.  13,  "And  it  came  to 
pass,  when  Joshua  was  by  Jericho,  that  he  lifted  up  his  eyes  and  looked,  and 
behold  there  stood  a  man  over  against  him  with  his  sword  drawn  in  his 
hand ;  and  Joshua  went  unto  him  and  said  unto  him,  Art  thou  for  us,  or  for 
our  adversaries f  Verse  14,  "And  he  said,  Nay;  but  as  the  captain  of  the 
hosts  of  our  Lord  am  I  now  come.  And  Joshua  fell  on  his  face  to  the  earth, 
and  did  worship  and  said  unto  him,  What  saith  my  Lord  unto  his  servant?" 
Verse  16,  "  And  the  captain  of  the  Lord's  host  said  unto  Joshua,  Loose  thy 
shoe  from  off  thy  foot ;  for  the  place  whereon  thou  standeth  is  holy.  And 
Joshua  did  so."  And  what  then ;  nothing,  for  here  the  story  ends,  and  the 
chapter  too. 

Either  this  story  is  broken  off  in  the  middle,  or  it  is  a  story  told  by 
some  Jewish  humorist,  in  ridicule  of  Joshua's  pretended  mission  from  God; 
and  the  compilers  of  the  Bible,  not  perceiving  the  design  of  the  story,  hav« 
told  it  as  a  serious  matter.  As  a  story  of  humor  and  ridicule,  it  has  a  great 
deal  of  point,  for  it  pompously  introduces  an  angel  in  the  figure  of  a  man, 
with  a  drawn  sword  in  his  hand,  before  whom  Joshua  falls  on  his  face  to  the 
earth,  and  worships,  (which  is  contrary  to  their  second  commandment ;)  and 
then,  this  most  important  embassy  from  heaven  ends,  in  telling  Joshua  to 
pull  off  his  shoe.  It  might  as  well  have  told  him  to  pull  up  his  breeches. 

It  is  certain,  however,  that  the  Jews  did  not  credit  every  thing  their 
leaders  told  them,  as  appears  from  the  cavalier  manner  in  which  they  speak 
of  Moses,  when  he  was  gone  into  the  mount.  "  As  for  this  Moses,  say  they, 
w«  wot  not  what  is  become  of  him."  Exod.  chap,  x.  TTJJ.  ver.  1. 


:ABTH.] 


THE   AGE   OF   REASON. 


<jf  Ezra,  the  writer  gives  a  list  of  the  tribes  and  families, 
and  of  the  precise  number  of  souls  of  each  that  returned 
from  Babylon  to  Jerusalem ;  and  this  enrolment  of  the  per- 
eons  so  returned,  appears  to  have  been  one  of  the  principal 
objects  for  writing  the  book ;  but  in  this  there  is  an  error, 
that  destroys  the  intention  of  the  undertaking. 

The  writer  begins  his  enrolment  in  the  following  man- 
ner :  chap.  ii.  ver.  3,  "  The  children  of  Parosh,  two  thousand 
one  hundred  seventy  and  four."  Yer.  4,  "  The  children  of 
Shephatiah,  three  hundred  seventy  and  two."  And  in  this 
manner  he  proceeds  through  all  the  families ;  and  in  the  64th 
verse,  he  makes  a  total,  and  says,  the  whole  congregation  to- 
gether w as  forty  and  two  thousand  three  hundred  and  three- 
score. 

But  whoever  will  take  the  trouble  of  casting  up  the  sev- 
eral particulars,  will  find  that  the  total  is  but  29,818 ;  so 
that  the  error  is  12,542.*  What  certainty  then  can  there 
be  in  the  Bible  for  any  thing? 

Nehemiah,  in  like  manner,  gives  a  list  of  the  returned 
families,  and  of  the  number  of  each  family.  He  begins  as 
in  Ezra,  by  saying,  chap.  vii.  ver.  8,  "  The  children  of  Pa 
rosh,  two  thousand  three  hundred  and  seventy-two ;"  and 
so  on  through  all  the  families.  The  list  differs  in  several 
of  the  particulars  from  that  of  Ezra.  In  the  66th  verse, 
Nehemiah  makes  a  total,  and  says,  as  Ezra  had  said,  "  The 
whole  congregation  together  was  forty  and  two  thousand 
three  hundred  and  threescore."  But  the  particulars  of 
this  list  make  a  total  but  of  31,089,  so  that  the  error  here 
is  11,271.  These  writers  may  do  well  enough  for  Bible- 
makers,  but  not  for  any  thing  where  truth  and  exactness  is 
necessary.  The  next  book  in  course  is  the  book  of  Esther. 


*  Particulars  of  the  Families  from  the  second  chapter  of  Ezra. 

Chap.  ii. 

Bro't  forw.  11,577 

Bro't  forw.  15,783 

Brat  forw.  19,444 

Verses    3       2172 

Ver.  13             666 

Ver.  28            128 

Ver.  38            726 

4        872 

14           2056 

24             42 

84            846 

6        775 

15             454 

25            748 

85          8630 

6       2812 

16               98 

26            621 

86            97S 

7       1264 

17             823 

27            122 

87           1052 

8         945 

18             112 

28            228 

88          1247 

9         760 

19             223 

29              52 

89          1017 

10         642 

20               95 

80            166 

40              74 

11         628 

21             123 

81          1254 

41             128 

IS      1222 

22              56 

82            820 

42            139 

58             892 

60             652 

11,177.1                      16,782 

19,444 

Total,     19,811 

92  THE  AGE  OF  REASON.  [PAST  D 

II  Madam  Esther  thought  it  any  honor  to  oft'er  herself  as  a 
kept  mistress  to  Ahasuerus,  or  as  a  rival  to  Queen  Yashti, 
who  had  refused  to  come  to  a  drunken  king,  in  the  midst 
of  a  drunken  company,  to  be  made  a  show  of,  (for  the  ac- 
count says,  they  had  been  drinking  seven  days,  and  were 
merry,)  let  Esther  and  Mordecai  look  to  that,  it  is  no  busi- 
ness of  ours ;  at  least,  it  is  none  of  mine ;  besides  which 
the  story  has  a  great  deal  the  appearance  of  being  fabu- 
lous, and  is  also  anonymous.  I  pass  on  to  the  book  of  Job. 

The  book  of  Job  differs  in  character  from  all  the  books 
we  have  hitherto  passed  over.  Treachery  and  murder  make 
no  part  of  this  book ;  it  is  the  meditations  of  a  mind  strongly 
impressed  with  the  vicissitudes  of  human  life,  and  by  turns 
sinking  under,  and  struggling  against  the  pressure.  It 
is  a  highly  wrought  composition,  between  willing  submis- 
sion and  involuntary  discontent ;  and  shows  man,  as  he 
sometimes  is,  more  disposed  to  be  resigned  than  he  is  ca- 
pable of  being.  Patience  has  but  a  small  share  in  the  char 
acter  of  the  person  of  whom  the  book  treats ;  on  the  con 
trary,  his  grief  is  often  impetuous ;  but  he  still  endeavors  to 
keep  a  guard  upon  it,  and  seems  determined,  in  the  midst 
of  accumulating  ills,  to  impose  upon  himself  the  hard  duty 
of  contentment. 

I  have  spoken  in  a  respectful  manner  of  the  book  of 
Job  in  the  former  part  of  the  Age  of  Reason,  but  without 
knowing  at  that  time  what  I  have  learned  since ;  which  is, 
that  from  all  the  evidence  that  can  be  collected,  the  book 
of  Job  does  not  belong  to  the  Bible. 

I  have  seen  the  opinion  of  two  Hebrew  commentators, 
Abenezra  and  Spinoza,  upon  this  subject;  they  both  say 
that  the  book  of  Job  carries  no  internal  evidence  of  being 
an  Hebrew  book ;  that  the  genius  of  the  composition,  and 
the  drama  of  the  piece,  are  not  Hebrew ;  that  it  has  been 
translated  from  another  language  into  Hebrew,  and  that 
the  author  of  the  book  was  a  Gentile ;  that  the  character 
represented  under  the  name  of  Satan  (which  is  the  first 
and  only  time  this  name  is  mentioned  in  the  Bible)  doeg 
not  correspond  to  any  Hebrew  idea ;  and  that  the  two  con 
vocations  which  the  Deity  is  supposed  to  have  made  of 
those,  whom  the  poem  calls  sons  of  God,  and  the  familiarity 
which  this  supposed  Satan  is  stated  to  have  with  the  Deity 
are  in  the  same  case. 

It  may  also  be  observed,  that  the  book  shows  itself  to  be 
the  production  of  a  mind  cultivated  in  science,  which  the 


PAJCT  II. J  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  93 

Jews,  so  far  from  being  famous  for,  were  very  ignorant  of. 
the  allusions  to  objects  of  natural  philosophy  are  frequent 
and  strong,  and  are  of  a  different  cast  to  any  thing  in  the 
books  known  to  be  Hebrew.  The  astronomical  names, 
Pleiades,  Orion,  and  Arcturus,  are  Greek  and  not  Hebrew 
names,  and  it  does  not  appear  from  any  thing  that  is  to  bo 
found  in  the  Bible,  that  the  Jews  knew  any  thing  of  astron- 
omy, or  that  they  studied  it ;  they  had  no  translation  of 
those  names  into  their  own  language,  but  adopted  the  names 
as  they  found  them  in  the  poem. 

That  the  Jews  did  translate  the  literary  productions 
of  the  Gentile  nations  into  the  Hebrew  language,  and  mix 
them  with  their  own,  is  not  a  matter  of  doubt ;  the  thirty- 
first  chapter  of  Proverbs  is  an  evidence  of  this ;  it  is  there 
said,  ver.  1,  The  word  of  king  Lemuel,  the  prophecy  which 
his  mother  taught  him.  This  verse  stands  as  a  preface  to 
the  proverbs  that  follow,  and  which  are  not  the  proverbs 
of  Solomon,  but  of  Lemuel ;  and  this  Lemuel  was  not  one 
of  the  kings  of  Israel,  nor  of  Judah,  but  of  some  other 
country,  and  consequently  a  Gentile.  The  Jews,  however, 
have  adopted  his  proverbs,  and  as  they  cannot  give  any  ac- 
count who  the  author  of  the  book  of  Job  was,  or  how  they 
came  by  the  book ;  and  as  it  differs  in  character  from  the 
Hebrew  writings,  and  stands  totally  unconnected  with 
every  other  book  and  chapter  in  the  Bible,  before  it,  and 
after  it,  it  has  all  the  circumstantial  evidence  of  being  orig- 
inally a  book  of  the  Gentiles.* 

The  Bible-makers,  and  those  regulators  of  time,  the 
chronologists,  appear  to  have  been  at  a  loss  where  to  place 
and  how  to  dispose  of  the  book  of  Job ;  for  it  contains  no 

*  The  prayer  known  by  the  name  of  Agur's  Prayer,  in  »ne  80th  chapter 
of  Proverbs,  immediately  preceding  the  proverbs  of  Lemuel,  and  which  ia 
the  only  sensible,  well-conceived,  and  well-expressed  prayer  in  the  Bible, 
has  much  the  appearance  of  being  a  prayer  taken  from  the  Gentiles.  The 
name  of  Agur  occurs  on  no  other  occasion  than  this ;  and  he  is  introduced, 
together  with  the  prayer  ascribed  to  him,  in  the  same  manner,  and  nearly 
in  the  same  words,  that  Lemuel  and  his  proverbs  are  introduced  in  the 
•hapter  that  follows.  The  first  verse  of  the  30th  chapter  says,  "  The  words  of 
Agur,  the  son  of  Jakeh,  even  the  prophecy ;"  here  the  word  prophecy  is 
used  with  the  same  application  it  has  in  the  following  chapter  of  Lemuel, 
unconnected  with  anything  of  prediction.  The  prayer  of  Agur  is  in  the 
8th  and  9th  verses,  "  Remove  far  from  me  vanity  and  lies  ;  give  me  neither 
rights  nor  poverty,  but  feed  me  with  food  convenient  for  me  ;  lest  1  be  full  and 
deny  thee,  and  nay,  Who  is  the  Lord  f  or  lest  J  be  poor  and  steal,  and  take  tht 
name  of  my  God  in  vain."  This  has  not  any  of  the  marks  of  being  a  Jewish 
prayer,  for  the  Jews  never  prayed  but  when  they  were  in  trouble,  and 
Mver  for  anything  but  victory,  vengeance  and  riches. 


94  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  [PAST  H. 

one  historical  circumstance,  nor  allusion  to  any,  that  might 
serve  to  determine  its  place  in  the  Bible.  But  it  would 
not  have  answered  the  purpose  of  these  men  to  have  in- 
formed the  world  of  their  ignorance  ;  and,  therefore,  they 
have  affixed  it  to  the  sera  of  1520  years  before  Christ, 
which  is  during  the  time  the  Israelites  were  in  Egypt,  and 
for  which  they  have  just  as  much  authority  and  no  more 
than  I  should  have  for  saying  it  was  a  thousand  years  be- 
fore that  period.  The  probability,  however,  is,  that  it  ia 
older  than  any  book  in  the  Bible ;  and  it  is  the  only  one 
that  can  be  read  without  indignation  or  disgust. 

We  know  nothing  of  what  the  ancient  Gentile  world  (as 
it  is  called)  was  before  the  time  of  the  Jews,  whose  practice 
has  been  to  calumniate  and  blacken  the  character  of  all 
other  nations  ;  and  it  is  from  the  Jewish  accounts  that  we 
have  learned  to  call  them  heathens.  But,  as  far  as  we 
know  to  the  contrary,  they  were  a  just  and  moral  people, 
and  not  addicted,  like  the  Jews,  to  cruelty  and  revenge, 
but  of  whose  profession  of  faith  we  are  unacquainted.  It 
appears  to  have  been  their  custom  to  personify  both  virtue 
and  vice  by  statues  and  images,  as  is  done  now-a-days  both 
by  statuary  and  by  painting ;  but  it  does  not  follow  from 
this,  that  they  worshipped  them  any  more  than  we  do.  I 
pass  on  to  the  book  of 

Psalms,  of  which  it  is  not  necessary  to  make  much  ob- 
servation. Some  of  them  are  moral,  and  others  are  very 
revengeful ;  and  the  greater  part  relates  to  certain  local 
circumstances  of  the  Jewish  nation  at  the  time  they  were 
written,  with  which  we  have  nothing  to  do.  It  is,  however, 
an  error  or  an  imposition  to  call  them  the  Psalms  of  David ; 
they  are  a  collection,  as  song-books  are  now-a-days,  from 
different  song-writers,  who  lived  at  different  times.  The 
137th  Psalm  could  not  have  been  written  till  more  than 
400  years  after  the  time  of  David,  because  it  was  written 
in  commemoration  of  an  event,  the  captivity  of  the  Jews 
in  Babylon,  which  did  not  happen  till  that  distance  of  time. 
"By  the  rivers  of  JSabylon  we  sat  down  ;  yea,  we  wept  when 
we  remembered  Zion.  We  hanged  our  harps  upon  the  willows,, 
in  the  midst  thereof ;  for  there  they  that  had  carried  us  away 

Ztive,  required  of  us  a  song,  saying,  sing  us  one  of  the  songs 
Zion."     As  a  man  would  say  to  an  American,  or  to  a 
inchman,  or  to  an  Englishman,  sing  us  one  of  your 
American  songs,  or  of  your  French  songs,  or  of  your  En^ 
lish  songs.     This  remark  with   respect  to  the  time  thai 


PAKT  II.]  THE    AUK    OF   REASON.  96 

Psalm  was  written,  is  of  no  other  use  than  to  show  (among 
others  already  mentioned)  the  general  imposition  the  world 
has  been  under,  with  respect  to  the  authors  of  the  Bible. 
No  regard  lias  been  paid  to  time,  place,  and  circumstance ; 
and  the  names  of  persons  have  been  affixed  to  the  several 
books,  which  it  was  as  impossible  they  should  write,  aa 
that  a  man  should  walk  in  procession  at  his  own  funeral. 

The  Book  of  Proverbs.  These,  like  the  Psalms,  are  a 
collection,  and  that  from  authors  belonging  to  other  nations 
than  those  of  the  Jewish  nation,  as  I  have  shown  in 
the  observations  upon  the  book  of  Job ;  besides  which, 
some  of  the  proverbs  ascribed  to  Solomon  did  not  appear 
till  two  hundred  and  fifty  years  after  the  death  of  Solomon  ; 
for  it  is  said  in  the  1st  verse  of  the  25th  chapter,  "  These 
are  also  proverbs  o£  Solomon,  which  the  men  of  Hezekiah, 
king  of  Judah,  copied  out"  It  was  two  hundred  and  fifty 
years  from  the  time  of  Solomon  to  the  time  of  Hezekiah. 
When  a  man  is  famous  and  his  name  is  abroad,  he  is  made 
the  putative  father  of  things  he  never  said  or  did ;  and  this, 
most  probably,  has  been  the  case  with  Solomon.  It  appears 
to  have  been  the  fashion  of  that  day  to  make  proverbs,  aa 
it  is  now  to  make  jest-books,  and  father  them  upon  those 
who  never  saw  them. 

The  book  of  Ecclesiastes,  or  the  Preacher,  is  also  ascribed 
to  Solomon,  and  that  with  much  reason,  if  not  with  truth. 
Ct  is  written  as  the  solitary  reflections  of  a  worn-out  de- 
jauchee,  such  as  Solomon  was,  who  looking  back  on  scenes 
he  can  no  longer  enjoy,  cries  out  All  is  vanity  !  A  great 
deal  of  the  metaphor  and  of  the  sentiment  is  obscure,  most 
probably  by  translation ;  but  enough  is  left  to  show  they 
were  strongly  pointed  in  the  original.*  From  what  is 
transmitted  to  us  of  the  character  of  Solomon,  he  was 
witty,  ostentatious,  dissolute,  and  at  last  melancholy.  He 
lived  fast,  and  died,  tired  of  the  world,  at  the  age  of  fifty- 
eight  years. 

Seven  hundred  wives,  and  three  hundred  concubines, 
are  worse  than  none ;  and,  however  it  may  carry  with  it 
the  appearance  of  heightened  enjoyment,  it  defeats  all  the 
felicity  of  affection,  by  leaving  it  no  point  to  fix  upon  ;  di- 
vided love  is  never  happy.  This  was  the  case  with  Solo- 
mon ;  and  if  he  could  not,  with  all  his  pretensions  to  wis- 
dom, discover  it  beforehand,  he  merited,  unpitied,  the  mor- 

•  Those  that  look  out  of  tht  window  shall  bt  darlctntd,  U  an  obacur*  figUM 
IB  translation  for  lost  of  sight 


96  THE   AGE   OF   SEASON.  [PART  II* 

tification  he  afterwards  endured.  In  this  point  of  view, 
his  preaching  is  unnecessary,  because,  to  know  the  conse- 
quences, it  is  only  necessary  to  know  the  cause.  Seven 
hundred  wives,  and  three  hundred  concubines,  would  have 
stood  in  place  of  the  whole  book.  It  was  needless  after 
this  to  say  that  all  was  vanity  and  vexation  of  spirit ;  for  it 
is  impossible  to  derive  happiness  from  the  company  of  those 
whom  we  deprive  of  happiness. 

To  be  happy  in  old  age  it  is  necessary  that  we  accustom 
ourselves  to  objects  that  can  accompany  the  mind  all  the  way 
through  life,  and  that  we  take  the  rest  as  good  in  their  day. 
The  mere  man  of  pleasure  is  miserable  in  old  age  ;  and  the 
mere  drudge  in  business  is  but  little  better ;  whereas,  nat- 
ural philosophy,  mathematical  and  mechanical  science,  are 
a  continual  source  of  tranquil  pleasure ;  and  in  spite  of  the 
gloomy  dogmas  of  priests,  and  of  superstition,  the  study 
of  those  things  is  the  study  of  the  true  theology  ;  it  teachep 
man  to  know  and  to  admire  the  Creator,  for  the  principles 
of  science  are  in  the  creation,  and  are  unchangeable,  and 
of  divine  origin. 

Those  who  knew  Benjamin  Franklin  will  recollect,  that 
his  mind  was  ever  young ;  his  temper  ever  serene ;  science, 
that  never  grows  gray,  was  always  his  mistress.  He  was 
never  without  an  object,  for  when  we  cease  to  have  an  ob- 
ject, we  become  like  an  invalid  in  an  hospital  waiting  for 
death. 

Solomon's  Songs  are  amorous  and  foolish  enough,  but 
which  wrinkled  fanaticism  has  called  divine.  The  com- 
pilers of  the  Bible  have  placed  these  songs  after  the  book 
of  Ecclesiastes ;  and  the  chronologists  have  affixed  to  them 
the  sera  of  10l4  years  before  Christ,  at  which  time  Solo* 
mon,  according  to  the  same  chronology,  was  nineteen  years 
of  age,  and  was  then  forming  his  seraglio  of  wives  and 
concubines.  The  Bible-makers  and  the  chronologists  should 
have  managed  this  matter  a  little  better,  and  either  have 
said  nothing  about  the  time,  or  chosen  a  time  less  incon- 
sistent with  the  supposed  divinity  of  those  songs ;  for  Sol- 
omon was  then  in  the  honey-moon  of  one  thousand  de- 
baucheries. 

It  should  also  have  occurred  to  them,  that  as  he  wrote, 
if  he  did  write  the  book  of  Ecclesiastes,  long  after  these 
songs,  and  in  which  he  exclaims,  that  all  is  vanity  and  vex- 
ation of  spirit ;  that  he  included  those  songs  in  that  descrip- 
tion. This  is  the  more  probable,  because  he  Bays,  or  some- 


PABT  H.]  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  97 

body  for  him,  Ecclesiastes,  chap.  ii.  v.  8,  "  I  got  me  nun  s-^ng- 
ers,  and  women  singers,  (most  probably  to  sing  those  songs,) 
and  musical  instruments  of  all  sorts  /  and  behold,  (ver.  11,) 
all  was  vanity  and  vexation  of  spirit."  The  compilers, 
however,  have  done  their  work  but  by  halves ;  for  as  they 
have  given  us  the  songs,  they  should  have  g'ven  us  the 
tunes,  that  we  might  sing  them. 

The  books,  called  the  books  of  the  Prophets,  fill  up  all 
the  remaining  parts  of  the  Bible  ;  they  are  sixteen  in  num- 
ber, beginning  with  Isaiah,  and  ending  with  Malachi,  of 
which  I  have  given  you  a  list  in  my  observations  upon 
Chronicles.  Of  these  sixteen  prophets,  all  of  whom,  except 
the  three  last,  lived  within  the  time  the  books  of  Kings  and 
Chronicles  were  written ;  two  only,  Isaiah  and  Jeremiah, 
are  mentioned  in  the  history  of  those  books.  I  shall  begin 
with  those  two,  reserving  what  I  have  to  say  on  the  genera- 
character  of  the  men  called  prophets  to  another  part  of  the 
work. 

Whoever  will  take  the  trouble  of  reading  the  book  as 
cribed  to  Isaiah,  will  find  it  one  of  the  most  wild  and  dis 
orderly  compositions  ever  put  together ;  it  has  neither  be 
ginning,  middle,  nor  end ;  and,  except  a  short  historical 
part,  and  a  few  sketches  of  history  in  two  or  three  of  the 
first  chapters,  is  one  continued  incoherent,  bombastical 
rant,  full  of  extravagant  metaphor,  without  application, 
and  destitute  of  meaning ;  a  school-boy  would  scarcely  have 
been  excusable  for  writing  such  stuff;  it  is  (at  least  in  the 
translation)  that  kind  of  composition  and  false  taste,  that  is 
properly  called  prose  run  mad. 

The  historical  part  begins  at  the  36th  chap.,  and  is  continued 
to  the  end  of  the  39th  chap.  It  relates  to  some  matters  that 
are  said  to  have  passed  during  the  I'eign  of  Hezekiah,  King  of 
Judah  at  which  time  Isaiah  lived.  This  fragment  of  history 
begins  and  ends  abruptly ;  it  has  not  the  least  connection  with 
the  chapter  that  precedes  it,  nor  with  that  which  follows  it, 
nor  with  any  other  in  the  book.  It  is  probable  that  Isaiah 
wrote  this  fragment  himself,  because  he  was  an  actor  in  the, 
circumstances  it  treats  of;  but,  except  this  part,  there  are 
scarcely  two  chapters  that  have  any  connection  with  each 
other ;  one  is  entitled,  at  the  beginning  of  the  first  verse, 
the  burden  of  Babylon  ;  another,  the  burden  of  Moab ; 
another,  the  burden  of  Damascus ;  another,  the  burden  of 
Egypt ;  another,  the  burden  of  the  Desert  of  the  Sea ;  aft- 
other,  the  burden  of  the  Valley  of  Visioa ;  aa  yon  would 


#8  THE   AGE   OF   TKEASON.  ["PART  U 

Bay,  the  Btorj  of  the  knight  of  the  burning  mountain,  thg 
story  of  Cinderella,  or  the  Children  of  the  Wood,  &c.,  &c 

I  have  already  shown,  in  the  instance  of  the  two  last 
verses  of  Chronicles,  and  the  three  first  in  Ezra,  that  the 
compilers  of  the  Bible  mixed  and  confounded  the  writings 
of  different  authors  with  each  other,  which  alone,  were 
there  no  other  cause,  is  sufficient  to  destroy  the  authenticity 
of  any  compilation,  because  it  is  more  than  presumptive 
evidence  that  the  compilers  are  ignorant  who  the  authors 
were.  A  very  glaring  instance  of  this  occurs  in  the  book 
ascribed  to  Isaiah,  the  latter  part  of  the  44th  chapter,  and 
the  beginning  of  the  45th,  so  far  from  having  been  written 
by  Isaiah,  could  only  have  been  written  by  some  person 
who  lived,  at  least,  an  hundred  and  fifty  years  after  Isaiah 
was  dead. 

These  chapters  are  a  compliment  to  Cyrus,  who  per- 
mitted the  Jews  to  return  to  Jerusalem  from  the  Baby- 
lonian captivity,  to  rebuild  Jerusalem  and  the  temple,  as  is 
stated  in  Ezra.  The  last  verse  of  the  44th  chapter,  and 
the  beginning  of  the  45th,  are  in  the  following  words: 
"  That  saith  of  Cyrus,  he  is  my  shepherd,  and  shall  per- 
form all  my  pleasure;  even  saying  to  Jerusalem,  thou 
shalt  be  built:  and  to  the  temple  thy  foundations  shall  be  laid: 
thus  saith  the  Lord  to  his  anointed,  to  Cyrus,  whose  right 
hand  I  have  holden  to  subdue  nations  before  him,  and  1 
will  loose  the  loins  of  Icings  to  open  before  him  the  two- 
leaved  gates,  and  the  gates  shall  not  be  shut  j  I  will  go  be- 
fore thee,"  &c. 

"What  audacity  of  church  and  priestly  ignorance  it  is  to  im- 
pose this  book  upon  the  world  as  the  writing  of  Isaiah,  when 
Isaiah,  according  to  their  own  chronology,  died  soon  after 
the  death  of  Hezekiah,  which  was  698  years  before  Christ ; 
and  the  decree  of  Cyrus,  in  favor  of  the  Jews  returning  to  Je- 
rusalem, was,  according  to  the  same  chronology,  536  years  be- 
fore Christ ;  which  was  a  distance  of  time  between  the  two  of 
162  years.  I  do  not  suppose  that  the  compilers  of  the  Bible 
made  these  books,  but  rather  that  they  picked  up  some  loose, 
anonymous  essays,  and  put  them  together  under  the  names 
of  such  authors  as  best  suited  their  purpose.  They  have 
encouraged  the  imposition,  which  is  next  to  inventing  it , 
for  it  was  impossible  but  they  must  have  observed  it. 

When  we  see  the  studied  craft  of  the  scriptme-makers, 
in  making  every  part  of  this  romantic  book  of  school-boy's 
eloquence  bend  to  the  monstrous  idea  of  a  Son  of  God, 


PART  H.J  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  99 

begotten  by  a  ghost  on  the  body  of  a  virgin,  there  is  no 
imposition  we  are  not  justified  in  suspecting  them  of. 
Every  phrase  and  circumstance  are  marked  with  the  bar- 
barous nand  of  superstitious  torture,  and  forced  into  mean- 
ings it  was  impossible  they  could  have.  The  head  of  every 
chapter,  and  tlie  top  of  every  page,  are  blazoned  with  the 
names  of  Christ  and  the  Church,  that  the  unwary  reader 
might  suck  in  the  error  before  he  began  to  read. 

Behold  a  virgin  shall  conceive,  and  "bear  a  son,  Isaiah, 
chap.  vii.  ver.  14,  has  been  interpreted  to  mean  the  person 
called  Jesus  Christ,  and  his  mother  Mary,  and  has  been 
echoed  through  Christendom  for  more  than  a  thousand 
years ;  and  such  has  been  the  rage  of  this  opinion,  that 
scarcely  a  spot  in  it  but  has  been  stained  with  blood  and 
marked  with  desolation  in  consequence  of  it.  Though  it 
is  not  my  intention  to  enter  into  controversy  on  subjects  of 
this  kind,  but  to  confine  myself  to  show  that  the  Bible  is 
spurious ;  and  thus,  by  taking  away  the  foundation,  to  over- 
throw at  once  the  whole  structure  of  superstition  raised 
thereon ;  I  will,  however,  stop  a  moment  to  expose  the  fal- 
lacious application  of  this  passage. 

Whether  Isaiah  was  playing  a  trick  with  Ahaz,  king  of 
Judah,  to  whom  this  passage  is  spoken,  is  no  business  of 
mine ;  I  mean  only  to  show  the  misapplication  of  the  pas 
sage,  and  that  it  has  no  more  reference  to  Christ  and  his 
mother,  than  it  has  to  me  and  my  mother.  The  story  is 
simply  this : 

The  king  of  Syria  and  the  king  of  Israel  (I  have  already 
mentioned  that  the  Jews  were  split  into  two  nations,  one  of 
which  was  called  Judah,  the  capital  of  which  was  Jeru- 
salem, and  the  other  Israel)  made  war  jointly  against  Ahaz, 
king  of  Judah,  and  marched  their  armies  towards  Jerusalem. 
Ahaz  and  his  people  became  alarmed,  and  the  account  says, 
verse  2,  "  Their  hearts  were  moved  as  the  trees  of  the  wood 
are  moved  with  the  wind," 

In  this  situation  of  things,  Isaiah  addresses  himself  to 
Ahaz,  and  assures  him  in  the  name  of  the  Lord  (the  cant 
phrase  of  all  the  prophets)  that  these  two  kings  should 
not  succeed  against  him ;  and  to  satisfy  Ahaz  that  this 
should  be  the  case,  tells  him  to  ask  a  sign.  This,  the  ac- 
count says,  Ahaz  declined  doing;  giving  as  a  reason  that 
he  would  not  tempt  the  Lord ;  upon  which  Isaiah,  who  ie 
the  speaker,  says,  ver.  44,  "Therefore  the  Lord  himself 
hhall  giro  you  a  sign ;  behold  a  virgin  shall  conceive  and 


100  THE  AGE  OF  REASON.  [PART  tt 

bear  a  son;"  and  the  16th  verse  says,  "And  before  this 
child  shall  know  to  refuse  the  evil,  and  chuse  the  good,  the 
land  which  thou  abhorrest  or  dreadest  (meaning  Syria  and 
the  kingdom  of  Israel)  shall  be  forsaken  of  both  her  kings." 
Here  then  was  the  sign,  and  the  time  limited  for  the  com- 
pletion of  the  assurance  or  promise ;  namely,  before  this 
child  should  know  to  refuse  the  evil  and  chuse  the  good. 

Isaiah  having  committed  himself  thus  far,  it  became 
necessary  to  him,  in  order  to  avoid  the  imputation  of  being 
a  false  prophet,  and  the  consequence  thereof,  to  take 
measures  to  make  this  sign  appear.  It  certainly  was  not  a 
difficult  thing,  in  any  time  of  the  world,  to  find  a  girl  with 
child,  or  to  make  her  so ;  and  perhaps  Isaiah  knew  of  one 
beforehand  ;  for  I  do  not  suppose  that  the  prophets  of  that 
day  were  any  more  to  be  trusted  than  the  priests  of  thie . 
be  that,  however,  as  it  may,  he  says  in  the  next  chapter, 
ver.  2,  "  And  I  took  unto  me  faithful  witnesses  to  record, 
Uriah  the  priest,  and  Zechariah  the  son  of  Jebe«?echiah,  and 
/  went  unto  the  prophetess,  and  she  conceived  and  bare  a 
eon" 

Here  then  is  the  whole  story,  foolish  as  it  is,  of  thiu 
child  and  this  virgin ;  and  it  is  upon  the  barefaced  perver- 
sion of  this  story,  that  the  book  of  Matthew,  and  the  im- 
pudence and  sordid  interests  of  priests  in  later  times,  have 
founded  a  theory  which  they  call  the  gospel ;  and  have  ap- 
plied this  story  to  signify  the  person  they  call  Jesus  Christ ; 
begotten,  they  say,  by  a  ghost,  whom  they  call  holy,  on  the 
body  of  a  woman,  engaged  in  marriage,  and  afterwards 
married,  whom  they  call  a  virgin,  TOO  years  after  this 
foolish  story  was  told ;  a  theory  which,  speaking  for  my- 
self, I  hesitate  not  to  believe,  and  to  say,  is  as  fabulous  and 
false  as  God  is  true.* 

But  to  show  the  imposition  and  falsehood  of  Isaiab  we 
have  only  to  attefld  to  the  sequel  of  this  story;  wh^n, 
though  it  is  passed  over  in  silence  in  the  book  of  Isaiat,  is 
related  in  the  28th  chapter  of  the  second  Chronicles ;  and 
which  is,  that  instead  of  these  two  kings  failing  in  their  at- 
tempt against  Ahaz,  king  of  Judah,  as  Isaiah  had  pretended  to 
foretel  in  the  name  of  the  Lord,  they  succeeded ;  Ahafc  wa« 

*  In  the  14th  verse  of  the  7th  chapter,  it  is  said,  that  the  child  should  be 
called  Immamiel ;  but  this  name  was  not  given  to  either  of  the  chiVwen, 
otherwise  than  as  a  character  which  the  word  signifies.  That  o*  the 
prophetess  was  called  Maher-shalal-hash-baz,  and  that  «f  Mary  was 
JMM. 


PAW  H.]  THE   AGE   OF  KEABOK.  101 

defeated  and  destroyed ;  a  hundred  and  twenty  thousand 
of  his  people  were  slaughtered ;  Jerusalem  was  plundered, 
and  two  hundred  thousand  women,  and  sons  and  daughter^ 
carried  into  captivity.  Tims  much  for  this  lying  prophet 
and  impostor  Isaiah,  and  the  book  of  falsehoods  that  bears 
his  name.  I  pass  on  to  the  book  of 

Jeremiah.  This  prophet,  as  he  is  called,  lived  in  the 
time  that  Nebuchadnezzar  besieged  Jerusalem,  in  the  reign 
of  Zedekiah,  the  last  king  of  Judah ;  and  the  suspicion  was 
strong  against  him,  that  he  was  a  traitor  in  the  interest  of 
Nebuchadnezzar.  Every  thing  relating  to  Jeremiah  shows 
him  to  have  been  a  man  of  an  equivocal  character :  in  his 
metaphor  of  the  potter  and  the  clay,  c.  xvii.  he  guards  his 

Erognostications  in  such  a  crafty  manner,  as  always  to  leave 
imself  a  door  to  escape  by,  in  case  the  event  should  be 
contrary  to  what  he  had  predicted. 

In  the  7th  and  8th  verses  of  that  chapter,  he  makes  the 
Almighty  to  say,  "  At  what  instant  I  shall  speak  concerning 
a  nation,  and  concerning  a  kingdom,  to  pluck  up,  and  to 
pull  down,  and  destroy  it :  if  that  nation,  against  whom  I 
Lave  pronounced,  turn  from  their  evil.  I  will  repent  me  of 
the  evil  that  I  thought  to  do  unto  them."  Here  was  a 
proviso  against  one  side  of  the  case :  now  for  the  other  side. 
Yerses  9  and  10,  "  At  what  instant  I  shall  speak  con- 
cerning a  nation,  and  concerning  a  kingdom,  to  build  and 
to  plant  it,  if  it  do  evil  in  my  sight,  that  it  obey  not  my 
voice  :  then  I  will  repent  me  of  the  good  wherewith  I  said 
I  would  benefit  them."  Here  is  a  proviso  against  the 
other  side ;  and,  according  to  this  plan  of  prophesying,  a 
prophet  could  never  be  wrong,  however  mistaken  the  Al- 
mighty might  be.  This  sort  of  absurd  subterfuge,  and  this 
manner  of  speaking  of  the  Almighty,  as  one  would  speak 
of  a  man,  is  consistent  with  nothing  but  the  stupidity  of  the 
Bible. 

As  to  the  authenticity  of  the  book,  it  is  only  necessary 
to  read  it  in  order  to  decide  positively,  that,  though  some 
passages  recorded  therein  may  have  been  spoken  by  Jer 
miah,  he  is  not  the  author  of  the  book.  The  historical 
parts,  if  they  can  be  called  by  that  name,  are  in  the  meet 
confused  condition ;  the  same  events  are  several  times  re- 
peated, and  that  in  a  manner  different,  and  sometimes  in 
contradiction  to  each  other ;  and  this  disorder  runs  even  to 
the  last  chapter,  where  the  history,  upon  which  the  greater 
part  of  the  book  has  been  employed,  begins  anew,  and 


108  THE  A£E  OF  REASON.  [PART  H 

ends  abruptly.  The  book  has  all  the  appearance  of  being 
a  medley  of  unconnected  anecdotes,  respecting  persons  and 
things  of  that  time,  collected  together  in  the  same  rude 
manner  as  if  the  various  and  contradictory  accounts,  that 
are  to  be  found  in  a  bundle  of  newspapers,  respecting  per- 
sons and  things  of  the  present  day,  were  put  together  with- 
out date,  order,  or  explanation.  I  will  give  two  or  three 
examples  of  this  kind. 

It  appears,  from  the  account  of  the  37th  chapter,  that 
the  army  of  Nebuchadnezzar,  which  is  called  the  army  of 
the  Chaldeans,  had  besieged  Jerusalem  some  time ;  and  on 
their  hearing  that  the  army  of  Pharaoh,  of  Egypt,  was 
marching  against  them  they  raised  the  siege,  and  retreated 
for  a  time.  It  may  here  be  proper  to  mention,  in  order  to 
understand  this  confused  history,  that  Nebuchadnezzar  had 
besieged  and  taken  Jerusalem,  during  the  reign  of  Jehoa- 
kim,  the  predecessor  of  Zedekiah ;  and  that  it  was  Nebu- 
chadnezzar who  had  made  Zedekiah  king,  or  rather  viceroy ; 
and  that  this  second  siege,  of  which  the  book  of  Jeremiah 
treats,  was  in  consequence  of  the  revolt  of  Zedekiah 
against  Nebuchadnezzar.  This  will  in  some  measure  ac- 
count for  the  suspicion  that  affixes  itself  to  Jeremiah  of  be- 
ing a  traitor,  and  in  the  interest  of  Nebuchadnezzar ;  whom 
Jeremiah  calls,  in  the  43d  chap.  ver.  10,  the  servant  of 
God. 

The  llth  verse  of  this  chapter,  (the  37th,)  says,  "  And 
it  came  to  pass,  that,  when  the  army  of  the  Chaldeans  was 
broken  up  from  Jerusalem,  for  fear  of  Pharaoh's  army,  that 
Jeremiah  went  forth  out  of  Jerusalem,  to  go  (as  this  account 
states)  into  the  land  of  Benjamin,  to  separate  himself  thence 
in  the  midst  of  the  people ;  and  when  he  was  in  the  gate  of 
Benjamin  a  captain  of  the  ward  was  there,  whose  name  was 
Irijah ;  and  he  took  Jeremiah  the  prophet,  saying,  Thou 
fallest  away  to  the  Chaldeans;  then  Jeremiah  said,  It  is 
false,  I  fall  not  away  to  the  Chaldeans."  Jeremiah  being 
thus  stopped  and  accused,  was,  after  being  examined,  com- 
mitted to  prison,  on  suspicion  of  being  a  traitor,  where  he 
remained  as  is  stated  in  the  last  verse  of  this  chapter. 

But  the  next  chapter  gives  an  account  of  the  imprison- 
ment of  Jeremiah,  which  has  no  connection  with  this  ac- 
count, but  ascribes  his  imprisonment  to  another  circum- 
stance, and  for  which  we  must  go  back  to  the  21st  chapter. 
It  is  there  stated  ver.  1,  that  Zedekiah  sent  Pashur,  the  son 
of  Malchiah,  and  Zephaniah,  the  son  of  Maaseiah  the  priest, 


PAKT  H.J  THB   AGE   OF   REA8OK.  103 

to  Jeremiah  to  inquire  of  him  concerning  Nebuchadnezzar, 
whose  army  was  men  before  Jerusalem  ;  and  Jeremiah  said 
to  them,  ver.  8,  "  Thus  saith  the  Lord,  Behold  I  set  before  you 
the  way  of  life,  and  the  way  of  death ;  he  that  abideth  in 
this  cit}  shall  die  by  the  sword,  and  by  the  famine,  and  by 
the  pestilence;  but  he  that  goeth  out  and  falleth  to  the 
Chaldeans  that  besiege  you,  he  shall  live,  and  his  life  shall 
be  unto  him  for  a  prey." 

This  interview  and  conference  breaks  off  abruptly  at  the 
end  of  the  10th  verse  of  the  21st  chapter ;  and  such  is  the 
disorder  of  this  book  that  we  have  to  pass  over  sixteen 
chapters,  upon  various  subjects,  in  order  to  come  at  the 
continuation  and  event  of  this  conference ;  and  this  brings 
us  to  the  first  verse  of  the  38th  chapter,  as  I  have  just  men- 
tioned. 

The  38th  chapter  opens  with  saying,  "  Then  Shapatiah, 
the  son  of  Mattan  ;  Gedaliah,  the  son  of  Pashur ;  and  Jucal 
the  son  of  Shelemiah ;  and  Pashur,  the  son  of  Malchiah ; 
(here  are  more  persons  mentioned  than  in  the  21st  chapter,) 
heard  the  words  that  Jeremiah  spoke  unto  the  people,  say 
ing,  Thus  saith  the  Lord,  He  that  remaineth  in  this  city, 
shall  die  by  the  sword,  by  the  famine,  and  by  the  pestilence  / 
but  he  that  goeth  forth  to  the  Chaldeans  shall  live:  for  he 
thall  have  his  life  for  a  prey,  and  shall  live  ;  (whicn  are  the 
words  of  the  conference,)  therefore,  (say  they  to  Zedekiah,) 
We  beseech  thee,  let  us  put  this  man  to  death,ybr  thus  he 
weakeneth  the  hands  of  the  men  of  war  that  remain  in  this 
city,  and  the  hands  of  all  the  people  in  speaking  such  words 
unto  them  ;  for  this  man  seeketh  not  the  welfare  of  the  people, 
but  the  hurt :"  and  at  the  6th  verse  it  is  said,  "  Then  they 
took  Jeremiah,  and  put  him  into  a  dungeon  of  Malchiah. 

These  two  accounts  are  different  and  contradictory.  The 
one  ascribes  his  imprisonment  to  his  attempt  to  escape  out 
of  the  city ;  the  other  to  his  preaching  and  prophesying  in 
the  city ;  the  one  to  his  being  seized  by  the  guard  at  the 
gate ;  the  other  to  his  being  accused  before  Zedekiah,  by 
the  conferees.* 

*I  observed  two  chapters,  16th  and  17th,  in  the  first  book  of  Samuel,  that 
contradict  each  other  with  respect  to  David,  aud  the  manner  he  became  ac- 
quainted with  Saul ;  as  the  37th  and  38th  chapters  of  the  book  of  Jeremiah 
contradict  each  other  with  respect  to  the  cause  of  Jeremiah's  imprisonment. 

In  the  16th  chapter  of  Samuel,  it  is  said,  that  an  evil  spirit  of  God  troubled 
Saul,  and  that  his  servants  advised  him  (as  a  remedy)  "  to  seek  <mt  a  ma» 
who  was  a  cunning  player  upon  the  harp."  And  Saul  said,  ver.  17,  "  Pro- 
vid«  now  a  man  tint  can  play  well,  and  bring  him  unto  me."  Then  a» 


THE   A(*E   OF   EKASOJf.  [PAET  O. 

In  the  next  chapter  (the  39th)  we  have  another  insta;  .ce 
of  the  disordered  state  of  this  book :  for  notwithstand  ng 
the  siege  of  the  city  by  Nebuchadnezzar,  has  been  the  s  ib- 
ject  of  several  of  the  preceding  chapters,  particularly  the 
37th  and  38th,  the  39th  chapter  begins  as  if  not  a  word  had 
been  said  upon  the  subject ;  and  as  if  the  reader  was  to  be 
informed  of  every  particular  respecting  it ;  for  it  begins 
with  saying,  ver.  1,  u  In  the  ninth  year  of  Zedekiah,  king 
>f  Judah,  in  the  tenth  month,  came  Nebuchadnezzar,  king 
>f  Babybon,  and  all  his  army,  against  Jerusalem,  ard 
besieged  it"  etc.,  etc. 

But  the  instance  in  the  last  chapter  (the  52d)  is  dull 
more  glaring;  for  though  the  story  has  been  told  over  und 
over  again,  this  chapter  still  supposes  the  reader  not  to 
know  any  thing  of  it,  for  it  begins  by  saying,  ver.  1,  "  Zed- 
ekiah was  one  and  twenty  years  old  when  he  began  to  reign, 
and  he  reigned  eleven  years  in  Jerusalem,  and  his  mother"1* 
name  was  Hamutal,  the  daughter  of  Jeremiah  of  JLibnah, 
(ver.  4,)  and  it  came  to  pass  in  the  ninth  year  of  his  reign, 
in  the  tenth  month,  that  Nebuchadnezzar,  king  of  Babylon, 
came,  he  and  all  his  army,  against  Jerusalem,  and  pitched 
against  it,  and  built  forts  against  it"  etc.,  etc. 

It  is  not  possible  that  any  one  man,  and  more  particu- 
larly Jeremiah,  could  have  been  the  writer  of  this  book. 
'Hie  errors  are  such  as  could  not  have  been  committed  by 
.iny  person  sitting  down  to  compose  a  work.  Were  I,  or 

Bwered  one  of  his  servants,  and  said,  Behold,  I  have  seen  a  son  of  Jesse,  the 
Bethlemite,  that  is  cunning  in  playing,  and  a  mighty  man,  and  a  man  of  war, 
and  prudent  in  matters,  and  a  comely  person,  and  the  Lord  is  with  him ; 
wherefore  Saul  sent  messengers  unto  Jesse,  and  said,  "Send  me  David,  thy 
eon."  And  [verse  21]  David  came  to  Saul,  and  stood  before  him,  and  h« 
loved  him  greatly,  and  he  became  hts  armour-bearer ;  and  when  the  evil 
spirit  of  God  was  upon  Saul,  [verse  23]  David  took  his  harp,  and  played 
with  his  hand,  and  Saul  was  refreshed,  and  was  well. 

But  the  next  chapter  [17]  gives  an  account,  all  different  to  this,  of  tht 
manner  that  Saul  and  David  became  acquainted.  Here  it  is  ascribed  to 
David's  encounter  with  Goliah,  when  David  was  sent  by  his  father  to  carry 
provision  to  his  brethren  in  the  camp.  In  the  55th  verse  of  this  chapter  it 
is  said,  "  And  when  Saul  saw  David  go  forth  against  the  Philistine  [Goliahj 
he  said  to  Abner,  the  captain  of  the  host,  Abner,  whose  son  is  this  youth! 
And  Abner  said,  As  thy  soul  liveth,  O  king,  I  cannot  tell  And  the  king 
»aid,  Inquire  thou  whose  son  the  stripling  is.  And  as  David  returned  from 
the  slaughter  of  the  Philistine,  Abner  took  him  and  brought  him  I  efore 
Saul,  with  the  head  of  the  Philistine  in  his  hand ;  and  Saul  said  unto  him, 
Whose  son  art  thou,  thou  young  man  ?  And  David  answered,  "  I  am  th« 
•on  of  thy  servant  Jesse,  the  Bethlemite."  These  two  accounts  belie  each 
other,  because  each  of  them  supposes  Sai  1  and  David  not  to  have  known 
Mch  other  before.  This  book,  the  Bib'e,  U  too  ridiculous  fot  criticism. 


TABT  II.]  THE    A.QE   OF   EEA8ON.  lOfc 

any  other  man,  to  write  in  such  a  disordered  manner,  no- 
body would  read  what  was  written ;  and  every  body  would 
suppose  that  the  writer  was  in  a  state  of  insanity.  The  only 
way,  therefore,  to  account  for  this  disorder,  is,  that  the  book 
is  a  medley  of  detached  unauthenticated  anecdotes,  put  to- 
gether by  some  stupid  book-maker,  under  the  name  of 
Jeremiah ;  because  many  of  them  refer  to  him,  and  to  the 
circumstances  of  the  times  he  lived  in. 

Of  the  duplicity,  and  of  the  false  predictions  of  Jere- 
miah, I  shall  mention  two  instances,  and  then  proceed  to 
review  the  remainder  of  the  Bible. 

It  appears  from  the  38th  chapter,  that  when  Jeremiah 
was  in  prison,  Zedekiah  sent  for  him,  and  at  this  interview, 
which  was  private,  Jeremiah  pressed  it  strongly  on  Zedekiah 
to  surrender  himself  to  the  enemy.  "  If"  says  he,  (ver.  17,) 
"  thou  wilt  assuredly  go  forth  unto  the  king  of  Babylon's 
princes,  then  thy  soul  shall  live"  etc.  Zeofekiah  was  ap- 
prehensive that  what  passed  at  this  conference  should  be 
known ;  and  he  said  to  Jeremiah,  (ver.  25,)  "  If  the  princes 
(meaning  those  of  Judah)  hear  that  I  have  talked  with  thee, 
and  they  come  unto  thee,  and  say  unto  thee,  Declare  unto 
us  now  what  thou  hast  said  unto  the  king ;  hide  it  not  from 
us,  and  we  will  not  put  thee  to  death ;  and  also  what  the 
king  said  unto  thee ;  then  thou  shalt  say  unto  them,  I  pre- 
sented my  supplication  before  the  king ;  that  he  would  not 
cause  me  to  return  to  Jonathan's  house  to  die  there.  Then 
came  all  the  princes  unto  Jeremiah,  and  asked  him,  and  he 
fold  them  according  to  all  the  words  the  king  had  com- 
manded" Thus,  this  man  of  God,  as  he  is  called,  could 
tell  a  lie,  or  very  strongly  prevaricate,  when  he  supposed  it 
would  answer  his  purpose ;  for  certainly  he  did  not  go  to 
Zedekiah  to  make  his  supplication,  neither  did  he  make  it; 
he  went  because  he  was  sent  for,  and  he  employed  that 
opportunity  to  advise  Zedekiah  to  surrender  himself  to 
Nebuchadnezzar. 

Lt  the  34th  chapter,  is  a  prophecy  of  Jeremiah  to  Zede- 
kiah, in  these  words,  (ver.  2,)  "  Thus  saith  the  Lord,  Behold 
I  will  give  this  city  into  the  hands  of  the  king  of  Babylon, 
and  he  will  burn  it  with  fire ;  and  thou  shalt  not  escape  out 
of  his  hand,  but  that  thou  shalt  surely  be  taken,  and  de 
ttvered  into  his  hand ;  and  thine  eyes  snail  behold  the  eyes 
of  the  king  of  Babylon,  and  he  shall  speak  with  thee  month 
to  mouth,  and  thou  shalt  go  to  Babylon.  Yet'hear  the  voord 
of  the  Lord ;  O  Zedekiah,  king  of  Judah.  thus  saith  the 


106  THE    AGE   OF   REASON.  FpAKT  II. 

Lord,  Thou  shalt  not  die  ~by  the  sword,  but  thou  shall  die  in 
peace;  and  with  the  burnings  of  thy  fathers,  the  former 
kings  that  were  before  thee,  so  shall  they  burn  odours  for 
thee,  and  they  will  lament  thee,  saying,  Ah,  Loi'd  ;  for  1 
have  pronounced  the  word,  saith  the  Lord" 

Now,  instead  of  Zedekiah  beholding  the  eyes  of  the  king 
of  Babylon,  and  speaking  with  him  mouth  to  mouth,  and 
dying  in  peace,  and  with  the  burning  of  odours,  as  at  the 
funeral  of  his  fathers,  (as  Jeremiah  had  declared  the  Lord 
himself  had  pronounced,)  the  reverse,  according  to  the  52d 
chapter,  was  the  case;  it  is  there  said,  (ver.  10,)  "That  the 
king  of  Babylon  slew  the  sons  of  Zedekiah  before  his  eyes : 
then  he  put  out  the  eyes  of  Zedekiah,  and  bound  him  in 
chains,  and  carried  him  to  Babylon,  and  put  him  in  prison 
till  the  day  of  his  death."  What  then  can  we  say  of  these 
prophets,  but  that  they  are  impostors  and  liars  ? 

As  for  Jeremiah,'  he  experienced  none  of  those  evils. 
He  was  taken  into  favor  by  Nebuchadnezzar,  who  gave 
him  in  charge  to  the  captain  of  the  guard,  (chap,  xxxix. 
ver.  12,)  "  Take  him  (said  he)  and  look  well  to  him,  and  do 
him  no  harm ;  but  do  unto  him  even  as  he  shall  say  unto 
thee."  Jeremiah  joined  himself  afterwards  to.  Nebuchad- 
nezzar, and  went  about  prophesying  for  him  against  the 
Egyptians,  who  had  marched  to  the  relief  of  Jerusalem 
while  it  was  besieged.  Thus  much  for  another  of  the  lying 
prophets,  and  the  book  that  bears  his  name. 

I  have  been  the  more  particular  in  treating  of  the  books 
ascribed  to  Isaiah  and  Jeremiah,  because  those  two  are 
spoken  of  in  the  books  of  Kings  and  Chronicles,  which  the 
others  are  not.  The  remainder  of  the  books  ascribed  to  the 
men  called  prophets,  I  shall  not  trouble  myself  much  about; 
but  take  them  collectively  into  the  observations  I  shall 
offer  on  the  character  of  the  men  styled  prophets. 

In  the  former  part  of  the  Age  of  Reason,  I  have  said 
that  the  word  prophet  was  the  Bible  word  for  poet,  and 
that  the  flights  and  metaphors  of  Jewish  poets  have  been 
foolishly  erected  into  what  are  now  called  prophecies.  I 
am  sufficiently  justified  in  this  opinion,  not  only  because 
the  books  called  the  prophecies  are  written  in  poetical  lan- 
guage, but  because  there  is  no  word  in  the  Bible,  except  it 
be  the  word  prophet,  that  describes  what  we  mean  by  a  poet. 
I  have  also  said,  that  the  word  signifies  a  performer  upon 
musical  instruments,  of  which  I  have  given  some  instances; 
such  as  that  of  a  company  of  prophets  prophesying  with 


i  urr  n.j  THE  AGE  OF  KEASON.  107 

paalteries,  with  tabrets,  with  pipes,  with  harps,  etc.,  and 
t\iat  Saul  prophesied  with  them,  1  Sam.  chap.  x.  ver.  5.  It 
appears  from  this  passage,  and  from  other  parts  in  the  book 
01  Samuel,  that  the  word  prophet  was  confined  to  signify 
poeiry  and  music ;  for  the  person  who  was  supposed  to 
nave  a  visionary  insight  into  concealed  things,  was  not  a 
propnet  but  a  seer,*  (1  Sam.  chap.  ix.  ver.  9 ;)  and  it  was 
not  till  after  the  word  seer  went  out  of  use  (which  most 
probably  was  when  Saul  banished  those  he  called  wizards) 
that  the  profession  of  the  seer,  or  the  art  of  seeing,  became 
incorpoiated  into  the  word  prophet. 

Accoiding  to  the  modern  meaning  of  the  word  prophet 
and  prophesying,  it  signifies  foretelling  events  to  a  great  dis- 
tance of  ame ;  and  it  became  necessary  to  the  inventors  of  the 
gospel  to  give  it  this  latitude  of  meaning,  in  order  to  apply 
or  to  stretch  what  they  call  the  prophecies  of  the  Old  Tes- 
tament, to  me  times  of  the  New;  but  according  to  the  Old 
Testament,  the  prophesying  of  the  seer,  and  afterwards  of 
the  prophet,  so  far  as  the  meaning  of  the  word  seer  was  in- 
corporated into  that  of  prophet,  had  reference  only  to  things 
of  the  time  then  passing,  or  very  closely  connected  with  it; 
such  as  the  ev^nt  of  a  battle  they  were  going  to  engage  in, 
or  of  a  journej ,  or  of  any  enterprise  they  were  going  to  un- 
dertake, or  of  any  circumstance  then  pending,  or  of  any 
difficulty  they  were  then  in ;  all  of  which  had  immediate 
reference  to  themselves  (as  in  the  case  already  mentioned 
of  Ahaz  and  Isaiah  with  respect  to  the  expression,  Behold 
a  virgin  shall  conceive  and  bear  a  son,)  and  not  to  any  dis- 
tant future  time.  It  was  that  kind  of  prophesying  that 
corresponds  to  what  we  call  fortune-telling ;  such  as  casting 
nativities,  predicting  riches,  fortunate  or  unfortunate  mar- 
riages, conjuring  for  lost  goods,  etc. ;  and  it  is  the  fraud  of 
the  Christian  church,  not  that  of  the  Jews ;  and  the  igno- 
rance and  the  superstition  of  modern,  not  that  of  ancient 
times,  that  elevated  those  poetical,  musical,  conjuring, 
dreaming,  strolling  gentry,  into  the  rank  they  have  since 
had. 

But,  besides  this  general  character  of  all  the  prophets, 
they  had  also  a  particular  character.  They  were  in  parties, 
and  they  prophesied  for  or  against,  according  to  the  party 
they  were  with;  as  the  poetical  and  political  writers  of  the 

*  I  know  not  what  is  the  Hebrew  word  that  corresponds  to  the  %ord  seer 
ID  Eng.'Uh ;  bu*.  I  observe  it  is  translated  into  French  by  La  Voyaut,  front 
th*  rerb  voir  to  ut ;  and  which  means  the  p«non  who  MM,  or  the  wei. 


106  THE  AGE  OF  REASON.  fPABT  It. 

present  day  write  in  defence  of  the  party  they  associate 
with  against  the  other. 

After  the  Jews  were  divided  into  two  nations,  that  of 
Judah  and  that  of  Israel,  each  party  had  its  prophets,  who 
abused  and  accused  each  other  of  being  false  prophets,  ly- 
ing prophets,  impostors,  &c. 

The  prophets  of  the  party  of  Judah  prophesied  against 
the  prophets  of  the  party  of  Israel  ;  and  those  of  the  party 
of  Israel  against  those  of  Judah.  This  party  prophesying 
showed  itself  immediately  on  the  separation  under  the  first 
two  rival  kings,  Rehoboam  and  Jeroboam.  The  prophet 
that  cursed,  or  prophesied  against  the  altar  that  Jeroboam 
had  built  in  Bethel,  was  of  the  party  of  Judah,  where 
Rehoboam  was  king;  and  he  was  way-laid,  on  his  return 
home,  by  a  prophet  of  the  party  of  Israel,  who  said  unto 
him,  (1  Kings  chap,  x.)  "  Art  thou  the  man  of  God  that 
came  from  Judah  f  and  he  said,  lam"  Then  the  prophet 
of  the  party  of  Israel  said  to  him,  "lam  a  prophet  also,  as 
thou  art,  (signifying  of  Judah,)  and  an  angel  spake  unto  me 
by  the  word  of  the  Lord,  saying,  Bring  h^m  back  with  thee 
unto  thine  house,  that  he  may  eat  bread  and  drink  water  : 
out  (says  the  18th  verse)  he  lied  unto  him."  This  event, 
however,  according  to  the  story,  is,  that  the  prophet  of 
Judah  never  got  back  to  Judah,  for  he  was  found  dead  on 
the  road,  by  the  contrivance  of  the  prophet  of  Israel,  who, 
no  doubt,  was  called  a  true  prophet  by  his  own  party,  and 
the  prophet  of  Judah  a  lying  prophet. 

In  the  third  chapter  of  the  second  of  Kings,  a  story  is 
related  of  prophesying  or  conjuring,  that  shows,  in  several 
particulars,  the  character  of  a  prophet.  Jehoshaphat,  king 
of  Judah,  and  Joram,  king  of  Israel,  had  for  a  while  ceased 
their  party  animosity,  and  entered  into  an  alliance  ;  and 
these  two,  together  with  the  king  of  Edom,  engaged  in  a 
war  against  the  king  of  Moab.  After  uniting,  and  march- 
ing their  armies,  the  story  says,  they  were  in  great  distress 
for  water,  upon  which  Jehoshaphat,  said,  "  Is  there  not  here 
a  prophet  of  the  Lord,  that  we  may  enquire  of  the  Lord  by 
him  f  and  one  of  the  servants  of  the  king  of  Israel  said  here 
is  Elisha.  (Elisha  was  of  the  party  of  Judah.)  And 
Jehoshaphat,  the  king  of  Judah,  said,  The  word  of  tht 
Lord  is  with  him"  The  story  then  says,  that  these  three 


kings  went  down  to  Elisha  ;  and  when  Elisha  (who,  as  I 
have  said,  was  a  Judahmite  prophet)  sav  the  king  of  Israel, 
he  said  unto  him,  "  What  have  I  to  do  with  thee,  get  thee  to 


*AJTT  n.]  THE  AGE  OF  REASON.  109 

the  prophets  of  thy  father  and  tJie  prophets  of  thy  mother. 
Nay  but,  said  the  Tang  of  Israel,  tlte  Lord  hath  catted  these 
three  Icings  together,  to  deliver  them  into  the  hands  of  the 
king  of  Moab,  (meaning  because  of  the  distress  they  were 
in  for  water ;)  upon  which  Elisha  said,  "  As  the  Lord  of 
hosts  liveth  before  whom  I  stand,  surely,  were  it  not  that  I 
regarded  Jelwshaphcd,  king  of  Judah,  I  would  not  look  to- 
wards  thee,  nor  see  thee"  Here  is  all  the  venom  and  vul- 
garity of  a  party  prophet.  We  have  now  to  see  the  per- 
formance, or  manner  of  prophesying. 

Yer.  15.  "  Bring  me,  said  Elisha,  "  a  minstrel ;  and  it 
came  to  pass,  when  the  minstrel  played,  that  the  hand  of  the 
Lord  came  upon  him.'1'1  Here  is  the  farce  of  the  conjuror. 
.Now  for  the  prophecv :  "And  Elisha  said,  (singing  most 
probably  to  the  tune  he  was  playing.)  Thus  saith  the  Lord, 
Make  this  valley  full  of  ditches;"  which  was  just  telling 
them  what  every  countryman  could  have  told  them  with- 
out either  fiddle  or  farce,  that  the  way  to  get  water  was  to 
dig  for  it. 

But  as  every  conjuror  is  not  famous  alike  for  the  same 
thing  so  neither  were  those  prophets ;  for  though  all  of  them, 
at  least  those  I  have  spoken  of,  were  famous  for  lying,  some 
of  them  excelled  in  cursing.  Elisha,  whom  I  have  just 
mentioned,  was  a  chief  in  this  branch  of  prophesying;  it 
was  he  that  cursed  the  forty-two  children  in  the  name  of 
the  Lord,  whom  the  two  she-bears  came  and  devoured.  We 
are  to  suppose  that  those  children  were  of  the  party  of 
Israel;  bat  as  those  who  will  curse  will  lie,  there  is  just  as 
much  credit  to  be  given  to  this  story  of  Elisha's  two  she- 
bears  as  there  is  to  that  of  the  Dragon  of  Wantley,  of  whom 
;t  is  said, — 

Poor  children  three  devoured  he, 
That  could  not  with  him  grapple ; 
And  at  one  sup  he  eat  them  up, 
As  a  man  would  eat  an  apple. 

There  was  another  description  of  men  called  prophets, 
that  amused  themselves  with  dreams  and  visions;  but 
whether  by  night  or  by  day,  we  know  not.  These,  if  they 
were  not  quite  harmless,  were  but  little  mischievous.  Of 
this  class  are : 

Ezekiel  and  Danie*. ;  and  the  first  question  upon  those 
books,  as  upon  all  the  others,  is,  are  they  genuine  ?  that  is, 
were  they  written  by  Ezekiel  and  Daniel  ? 

Of  this  there  is  no  proof;  but  BO  far  as  my  own  opinion 


110  THE  AGE  OF  REASON  [PABT  K 

goes,  I  am  more  inclined  to  believe  they  were,  than  that 
mej  were  not.  My  reasons  for  this  opinion  are  as  follow  • 
First,  Because  those  books  do  not  contain  internal  evidence 
to  prove  they  were  not  written  by  Ezekiel  and  Daniel,  as 
the  oook  ascribed  to  Moses,  Joshua,  Samuel,  &c.,  &c.,  prove 
they  were  not  written  by  Moses,  Joshua,  Samuel,  &c. 

Secondly,  Because  they  were  not  written  till  after  the 
Babylonish  captivity  began ;  and  there  is  good  reason  to 
believe,  that  not  any  book  in  the  Bible  was  written  before 
that  period  :  at  least,  it  is  proveable,  from  the  books  them 
selves,  as  I  have  already  shown,  that  they  were  not  written 
till  after  the  commencement  of  the  Jewish  monarchy. 

Thirdly,  Because  the  manner  in  which  the  books  ascribed 
to  Ezekiel  and  Daniel  are  written,  agrees  with  the  condition 
these  men  were  in  at  the  time  of  writing  them. 

Had  thfi  numerous  commentators  and  priests,  who  have 
foolishly  employed  or  wasted  their  time  in  pretending  to 
expound  and  unriddle  those  books,  been  carried  into  cap- 
tivity, as  Ezekiel  and  Daniel  were,  it  would  have  greatly 
improved  their  intellects,  in  comprehending  the  reason  for 
this  mode  of  writing,  and  have  saved  them  the  trouble  of 
racking  their  invention,  as  they  have  done,  to  no  purpose , 
for  they  would  have  found  that  themselves  would  be  obliged 
to  write  whatever  they  had  to  write,  respecting  their  own 
affairs,  or  those  of  their  friends,  or  of  their  country,  in  a 
concealed  manner,  as  those  men  have  done. 

These  two  books  differ  from  all  the  rest ;  for  it  is  only 
these  that  are  filled  with  accounts  of  dreams  and  visions : 
and  this  difference  arose  from  the  situation  the  writers  were 
in  as  prisoners  of  war,  or  prisoners  of  state,  in  a  foreign 
country,  which  obliged  them  to  convey  even  the  most 
trifling  information  to  each  other,  and  all  their  political 
projects  or  opinions,  in  obscure  and  metaphorical  terms. 
They  pretend  to  have  dreamed  dreams,  and  seen  visions, 
because  it  was  unsafe  for  them  to  speak  facts  or  plain  lan- 
guage. We  ought,  however,  to  suppose,  that  the  persons 
to  whom  they  wrote,  understood  what  they  meant,  and  that 
it  was  not  intended  any  body  else  should.  But  these  busy 
commentators  and  priests  have  been  puzzling  their  wits  to 
find  out  what  it  was  not  intended  they  should  know,  and 
with  which  they  have  nothing  to  do. 

Ezekiel  and  Daniel  were  carried  prisoners  to  Babylon, 
under  the  first  captivity,  in  tbe  time  of  Jehoiakim,  nine 
years  before  the  second  capti  m  the  time  of  Zedekiah. 


PART  n.]  THE  AGE  OF  REASON.  Ill 

The  Jews  were  then  still  numerous,  and  had  considerable 
force  at  Jerusalem ;  and  as  it  is  natural  to  suppose  that  men 
in  the  situation  of  Ezekiel  and  Daniel,  would  be  meditating 
the  recovery  of  their  country,  and  their  own  deliverance,  it 
is  reasonable  to  suppose,  that  the  accounts  of  dreams  and 
visions,  with  which  these  books  are  filled,  are  no  other  than 
a  disguised  mode  of  correspondence,  to  facilitate  those  ob- 
jects :  it  served  them  as  a  cypher,  or  secret  alphabet.  If 
they  are  not  this,  they  are  tales,  reveries,  and  nonsense ; 
or,  at  least,  a  fanciful  way  of  wearing  off  the  wearisome- 
ness  of -captivity ;  but  the  presumption  is,  they  were  the 
former. 

Ezekiel  begins  his  books  by  speaking  of  a  vision  of 
cherubims,  ana  of  a  wheel  within  a  wheel,  which  he  says  he 
saw  by  the  river  Chebar,  in  the  land  of  his  captivity.  Is  it 
not  reasonable  to  suppose,  that  by  the  cherubims,  he  meant 
the  temple  at  Jerusalem,  where  they  had  figures  of  cheru  • 
bims  ?  and  by  a  wheel  within  a  wheel  (which,  as  a  figure, 
has  always  been  understood  to  signify  political  contrivance) 
Jie  project  or  means  of  recovering  Jerusalem  ?  In  the  lat- 
er part  of  this  book,  he  supposes  himself  transported  to 
Jerusalem,  and  into  the  temple  ;  and  he  refers  back  to  the 
vision  on  the  river  Chebar,  and  says,  (chap,  xliii.  ver.  3,) 
that  this  last  vision  was  like  the  vision  on  the  river  Chebar ; 
which  indicates,  that  those  pretended  dreams  and  visions 
had  for  their  object  the  recovery  of  Jerusalem,  and  nothing 
further. 

As  to  the  romantic  interpretations  and  applications,  wild 
as  the  dreams  and  visions  they  undertake  to  explain,  which 
commentators  and  priests  have  made  of  those  books,  that 
of  converting  them  into  things  which  they  call  prophecies, 
and  making  them  bend  to  times  and  circumstances,  as  far 
remote  even  as  the  present  day,  it  shows  the  fraud  or  the 
extreme  folly  to  which  credulity  or  priestcraft  can  go. 

Scarcely  any  thing  can  be  more  absurd,  than  to  suppose 
that  men  situated  as  Ezekiel  and  Daniel  were,  whose  coun- 
try was  overrun,  and  in  the  possession  of  the  enemy,  all 
their  friends  and  relations  in  captivity  abroad,  or  in  slavery 
at  home,  or  massacred,  or  in  continual  danger  of  it ;  scarcely 
any  thing,  I  say,  can  be  more  absurd,  than  to  suppose  that 
euch  men  should  find  nothing  to  do  but  that  of  employing 
their  time  and  their  thoughts  about  what  was  to  happen  to 
other  nations  a  thousand  or  two  thousand  years  after  they 
wer*  dead  ;  at  the  same  time,  nothing  is  more  natural  than 


112  THE  AGE  OF  REASON.  [PABT  IL 

that  they  should  meditate  the  recovery  of  Jerusalem  and 
their  own  deliverance ;  and  that  this  was  the  sole  object  of 
all  the  obscure  and  apparently  frantic  writings  contained  r 
those  books. 

In  this  sense,  the  mode  of  writing  used  in  those  two 
books  being  forced  by  necessity,  and  not  adopted  by 
choice,  is  not  irrational ;  but,  if  we  are  to  use  the  books  aa 
prophecies,  they  are  false.  In  the  29th  chapter  of  Ezekiel, 
speaking  of  Egypt,  it  is  said,  (ver.  11,)  "  No  foot  of  'man 
should  pass  through  it,  nor  foot  of  beast  should  pass  though 
it ;  neither  shall  it  be  inhabited  for  forty  years"  Tais  is 
what  never  came  to  pass,  and  consequently  it  is  false,  as  all 
the  books  I  have  already  reviewed  are.  I  here  clooe  this 
part  of  the  subject. 

In  the  former  part  of  the  Age  of  Reason  I  have  spoken 
of  Jonah,  and  of  the  story  of  him  and  the  whale.  A  fit 
story  for  ridicule,  if  it  was  written  to  be  believed  ;  or  of 
laughter,  if  it  was  intended  to  try  what  credulity  could 
swallow  ;  for,  if  it  could  swallow  Jonah  and  ih\s  whale,  it 
could  swallow  any  thing. 

But,  as  is  already  shown  in  the  observations  on  the  book 
of  Job  and  of  Proverbs,  it  is  not  always  certain  which  of  the 
books  in  the  Bible  are  originally  Hebrew,  or  only  transla- 
tions from  books  of  the  Gentiles  into  Hebrew ;  and,  as  the 
book  of  Jonah,  so  far  from  treating  of  the  affairs  of  the 
Jews,  says  nothing  upon  that  subject,  but  treats  altogether 
of  the  Gentiles,  it  is  more  probable  that  it  is  a  book  of  the 
Gentiles  than  of  the  Jews ;  and  that  it  has  been  written  as 
a  fable,  to  expose  the  nonsense  and  satirize  the  vicious  and 
malignant  character  of  a  Bible  prophet  or  a  predicting 
priest. 

Jonah  is  represented,  first,  as  a  disobedient  prophet,  run- 
ning away  from  his  mission,  and  taking  shelter  aboard  a 
vessel  of  the  Gentiles,  bound  from  Joppa  to  Tarshish  ;  as 
if  he  ignorantly  supposed,  by  such  a  paltry  contrivance,  he 
could  hide  himself  where  God  could  not  find  him.  The  ves- 
sel is  overtaken  by  a  storm  at  sea ;  and  the  mariners,  all  of 
whom  are  Gentiles,  believing  it  to  be  a  judgment,  on  ac- 
count of  some  one  on  board  who  had  committed  a  crime, 
agreed  to  cast  lots  to  discover  the  offender ;  and  the  lot 
fell  upon  Jonah.  But,  before  this,  they  had  cast  all  their 
wares  and  merchandise  overboard  to  lighten  the  vessel, 
while  Jonah,  like  a  stupid  fellow,  was  fast  asleep  in  the 
hold. 


PAKT  n.j  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  118 

After  the  lot  had  designated  Jonah  to  be  the  offender, 
.hey  questioned  him  to  know  who  and  what  he  wat  ?  and 
he  told  them  he  was  an  Hebrew  •  and  the  story  implies 
that  he  confessed  himself  to  be  guilty.  But  these  Gentiles, 
instead  of  sacrificing  him  at  once,  without  pity  or  mercy, 
as  a  company  of  Bible  prophets  or  priests  would  have  done 
by  a  Gentile  in  the  same  case,  and  as  it  is  related  Samuel 
had  done  by  Agag,  and  Moses  by  the  women  and  children, 
they  endeavorea  to  save  him,  though  at  the  risk  of  their 
own  lives ;  for  the  account  says :  "  Nevertheless  (that  is, 
though  Jonah  was  a  Jew  and  a  foreigner,  and  the  cause  of 
all  their  misfortunes,  and  the  loss  of  their  cargo)  the  men 
rowed  hard  to  bring  the  boat  to  land,  but  they  could  not,  for 
the  sea  wrought  and  was  tempestuous  against  them"  Still, 
however,  they  were  unwilling  to  put  the  fate  of  the  lot  into 
execution  ;  and  they  cried  (says  the  account)  unto  the  Lord, 
saying :  "  We  beseech  thee,  0  Lord,  let  us  not  perish  for  this 
man's  life,  and  lay  not  upon  us  innocent  blood  /  for  thou, 
0  Lord,  hast  done  as  it  pleased  thee."  Meaning  thereby, 
that  they  did  not  presume  to  judge  Jonah  guilty,  since 
that  he  might  be  innocent ;  but  that  they  considered  the 
lot  that  had  fallen  upon  him  as  a  decree  of  God,  or  as  it 
pleased  God.  The  address  of  this  prayer  shows  that  the 
Grentiles  worshipped  one  Supreme  Being,  and  that  they 
were  not  idolaters  as  the  Jews  represented  them  to  be. 
But  the  storm  still  continuing,  and  the  danger  increasing, 
they  put  the  fate  of  the  lot  into  execution,  and  cast  Jonah 
into  the  sea ;  where,  according  to  the  story,  a  great  fish 
swallowed  him  up  whole  and  alive. 

We  have  now  to  consider  Jonah  securely  housed  from 
the  storm  in  the  fish's  belly.  Here  we  are  told  that  Le 
prayed ;  but  the  prayer  is  a  made-up  prayer,  taken  from 
various  parts  of  the  Psalms,  without  any  connection  or  con- 
sistency, and  adapted  to  the  distress,  but  not  at  all  to  the 
condition,  that  Jonah  was  in.  It  is  such  a  prayer  as  a  Gen- 
tile, who  might  know  something  of  the  Psalms,  could  copy 
out  for  him.  This  circumstance  alone,  were  there  no  other, 
is  sufficient  to  indicate  that  the  whole  is  a  made-up  story. 
The  prayer,  however,  is  supposed  to  have  answered  the 
purpose,  and  the  story  goes  on,  (taking  up  at  the  same  time 
the  cant  language  of  a  Bible  prophet,)  saying  :  "  The  Lord 
spake  unto  the  fish,  and  it  vomited  out  Jonah  upon  dry 
tand." 

Jonah  thon  received  a  second  mission  to  Ninevah,  with 
8 


114  TBE   AGE   OF   BBA8O9T  [PABT  IL 

which  he  sets  out ;  and  we  have  now  to  consider  him  as  a 
preacher.  The  distress  he  is  represented  to  have  suffered, 
the  remembrance  of  his  own  disobedience  as  the  cause  of 
it,  and  the  miraculous  escape  he  is  supposed  to  have  had, 
were  sufficient,  one  would  conceive,  to  have  impressed  him 
with  sympathy  and  benevolence  in  the  execution  of  his 
mission ;  but,  instead  of  this,  he  enters  the  city  with  de- 
nunciation and  malediction  in  his  mouth,  crying :  "  Yet 
forty  days,  and Ninevah  shall  ~be  overthrown" 

We  have  now  to  consider  this  supposed  missionary  in 
the  last  act  of  his  mission  ;  and  here  it  is  that  the  malevo- 
lent spirit  of  a  Bible-prophet,  or  of  a  predicting  priest,  ap- 
pears in  all  that  blackness  of  character  that  men  ascribe  to 
the  being  they  call  the  devil. 

Having  published  his  predictions,  he  withdrew,  says  the 
story,  to  the  east  side  of  the  city.  But  for  what  ?  not  to 
contemplate,  in  retirement,  the  mercy  of  his  Creator  to 
himself  or  to  others,  but  to  wait,  with  malignant  impa- 
tience, the  destruction  of  Ninevah.  It  came  to  pass,  how- 
ever, as  the  story  relates,  that  the  Ninevites  reformed,  and 
that  Grod,  according  to  the  Bible-phrase,  repented  him  of 
the  evil  he  had  said  he  would  do  unto  them,  and  did  it  not. 
This,  saith  the  first  verse  of  the  last  chapter,  displeased 
Jonah  exceedingly  and  he  was  very  angry.  His  obdurate 
heart  would  rather  that  all  Ninevah  should  be  destroyed, 
and  every  soul,  young  and  old,  perish  in  its  ruins,  than  that 
his  prediction  should  not  be  fulfilled.  To  expose  the  char- 
acter of  a  prophet  still  more,  a  gourd  is  made  to  grow  up 
in  the  night,  that  promises  him  an  agreeable  shelter  from 
the  heat  of  the  sun,  in  the  place  to  which  he  is  retired ;  and 
the  next  morning  it  dies. 

Here  the  rage  of  the  prophet  becomes  excessive,  and  he 
is  ready  to  destroy  himself.  "  It  is  better,  said  he,  for  me  to 
die  than  to  live"  This  brings  on  a  supposed  expostulation 
between  the  Almighty  and  the  prophet;  in  which  the 
former  says,  "  Doest  thou  well  to  be  angry  for  the  gourd  f 
And  Jonah  said,  I  do  well  to  be  angry  even  unto  death  / 
Then  said  the  Lord,  Thou  hast  had  pity  on  the  gourd,  for 
which  thou  hast  not  labored,  neither  modest  it  to  grow,  which 
came  up  in  a  night,  and  perished  in  a  niaht  /  and  should 
not  I  spare  Ninevah,  that  great  city,  in  which  are  more  than 
threescore  thousand  persons,  that  cannot  discern  between  their 
right  hand  and  their  left  f" 

Here  is  both  the  winding  up  of  the  satire,  and  the  moral 


PART  H.]  THE  AGE  OF  SEASON.  116 

of  the  fable.  As  a  satire,  it  strikes  against  the  character 
of  all  the  Bible-prophets,  and  against  all  the  indiscriminate 
judgments  upon  men,  women  and  children,  with  which 
this  lying  book,  the  Bible,  is  crowded ;  such  as  Noah's  flood, 
the  destruction  of  the  cities  of  Sodom  and  Gomorrah,  the 
extirpation  of  the  Canaanites,  even  to  sucking  infants,  and 
women  with  child,  because  the  same  reflection,  that  there 
are  mare  than  threescore  thousand  persons  that  cannot  dis- 
cern between  their  right  hand  and  their  left,  meaning  young 
children,  applies  to  all  their  cases.  It  satirizes  also  the  sup- 
posed partiality  of  the  Creator,  for  one  nation  more  than 
for  another. 

As  a  moral,  it  preaches  against  the  malevolent  spirit  of 
prediction ;  for  as  certainly  as  a  man  predicts  ill,  he  be- 
comes inclined  to  wish  it.  The  pride  of  having  his  judg- 
ment right,  hardens  his  heart,  till  at  last  he  beholds  with 
Batisfaction,  or  sees  with  disappointment,  the  accomplish- 
ment or  the  failure  of  his  predictions.  This  book  ends  with 
the  same  kind  of  strong  and  well-directed  point  against 
prophets,  prophecies  and  indiscriminate  judgments,  as  the 
chapter  that  Benjamin  Franklin  made  for  the  Bible,  about 
Abraham  and  the  stranger,  ends  against  the  intolerant  spirit 
of  religious  persecution.  Thus  much  for  the  book  Jonah. 

Of  the  poetical  parts  of  the  Bible,  that  are  called  pro- 
phecies, I  have  spoken  in  the  former  part  of  the  Age  of 
Reason,  and  already  in  this :  where  I  nave  said  that  the 
word  prophet  is  the  Bible-word  for  poet  /  and  that  the 
flights  and  metaphors  of  those  poets,  many  of  which  have 
become  obscure  by  the  lapse  of  time  and  the  change  of  cir- 
cumstances, have  been  ridiculously  erected  into  things 
called  prophecies,  and  applied  to  purposes  the  writers 
never  thought  of.  When  a  priest  quotes  any  of  those  pas- 
sages, he  unriddles  it  agreeably  to  his  own  views,  and  im- 
poses that  explanation  upon  his  congregation  as  the  mean- 
ing of  the  writer.  The  whore  of  ^Babylon  has  been  the 
common  whore  of  all  the  priests,  and  each  has  accused  the 
other  of  keeping  the  strumpet ;  so  well  do  they  agree  in 
their  explanations. 

There  now  remain  only  a  few  books,  which  they  call 
books  of  the  lesser  prophets ;  and  as  I  have  already  shown 
that  the  greater  are  impostors,  it  would  be  cowardice  to 
disturb  the  repose  of  the  little  ones.  Let  them  sleep,  then, 
in  the  arms  of  their  nurses,  the  priests,  and  both  be  for- 
got^en'  together. 


116  THE   AGE   OF  BEA8ON  [PAKT  H 

I  have  now  gone  through  the  Bible,  as  a  man  would  go 
through  a  wood  with  an  axe  on  his  shoulder,  and  fell  trees. 
Here  they  lie ;  and  the  priests,  if  they  can,  may  replant 
them.  They  may,  perhaps,  stick  them  in  the  ground,  but 
they  will  never  make  them  grow. — I  pass  on  to  the  books 
of  the  New  Testament. 


THE  NEW  TESTAMENT. 

The  New  Testament,  they  tell  us,  is  founded  upon  the 
prophecies  of  the  Old ;  if  so,  it  must  follow  the  fate  of  its 
foundation. 

As  it  is  nothing  extraordinary  that  a  woman  should  be 
with  child  before  she  is  married,  and  that  the  son  she  might 
bring  forth  should  be  executed,  even  unjustly,  I  see  no 
reason  for  not  believing  that  such  a  woman  as  Mary,  and 
such  a  man  as  Joseph,  and  Jesus,  existed ;  their  mere  ex- 
istence is  a  matter  of  indifference  about  which  there  is  no 
ground  either  to  believe  or  to  disbelieve,  and  which  comes 
under  the  common  head  of,  It  may  be  so  ;  and  what  than,  f 
The  probability,  however  is,  that  there  were  such  persons, 
or  at  least  such  as  resembled  them  in  part  of  the  circum- 
stances, because  almost  all  romantic  stories  have  been  sug- 
Sjsted  by  some  actual  circumstance ;  as  the  adventures  of 
obinson  Crusoe,  not  a  word  of  which  is  true,  were  sug- 
gested by  the  case  of  Alexander  Selkirk. 

It  is  not  the  existence,  or  non-existence,  of  the  persons 
that  I  trouble  myself  about ;  it  is  the  fable  of  Jesus  Christ, 
as  told  in  the  New  Testament,  and  the  wild  and  visionary 
doctrine  raised  thereon,  against  which  I  contend.  The 
story,  taking  it  as  it  is  told,  is  blasphemously  obscene.  Tt 
gives  an  account  of  a  young  woman  engaged  to  be  married, 
and  while  under  this  engagement,  she  is,  to  speak  plain 
language,  debauched  by  a  ghost,  under  the  impious  pre- 
tence, (Luke,  chap.  i.  ver.  35,)  that  "  the  Holy  Ghost  shall 
come  upon  thee,  and  the  power  of  the  Highest  shall  over- 
shadow thee"  Notwithstanding  which,  Joseph  afterwards 
marries  her,  cohabits  with  her  as  his  wife,  and  in  his  turn 
rivals  the  ghost.  This  is  putting  the  story  into  intelligible 
language,  and  when  told  in  this  manner,  there  is  not  a 
priest  but  must  be  ashamed  to  own  it.* 

*  Mary,  the  supposed  virgin  mother  of  Jesus,  had  sev«rmi  other  children, 
•oni  and  daughters.  See  Matt  chap.  ziii.  65,  66. 


FA*  I  II. J  THE    AGE    OF    REASON.  117 

Obscenity  in  matters  of  faith,  howevei  wrapped  up,  is 
always  a  token  of  fable  and  imposture ;  for  it  is  necessary 
to  our  serious  belief  in  God,  that  we  do  not  connect  it  with 
stories  that  run,  as  this  does,  into  ludicrous  interpretations. 
This  story  is,  upon  the  face  of  it,  the  same  kind  of  story  as 
that  of  Jupiter  and  Leda,  or  Jupiter  and  Europa,  or  any 
of  the  amorous  adventures  of  Jupiter;  and  shows,  as  is 
already  stated  in  the  former  part  of  the  Age  of  Reason^ 
that  the  Christian  faith  is  built  upon  the  heathen  mythology 

As  the  historical  parts  of  the  New  Testament,  so  far  as 
concerns  Jesus  Christ,  are  confined  to  a  very  short  space 
of  time,  less  than  two  years,  and  all  within  the  same  coun- 
try, and  nearly  in  the  same  spot,  the  discordance  of  time, 
place  and  circumstance,  which  detects  the  fallacy  of  the 
books  of  the  Old  Testament,  and  proves  them  to  be  impo- 
sitions, cannot  be  expected  to  be  found  here  in  the  same 
abundance.  The  New  Testament  compared  wich  the  Old, 
is  like  a  farce  of  one  act,  in  which  there  is  not  room  for 
rery  numerous  violations  of  the  unities.  There  are,  however, 
some  glaring  contradictions,  which,  exclusive  of  the  fallacy 
of  the  pretended  prophecies,  are  sufficient  to  show  the  story 
of  Jesus  Christ  to  be  false. 

I  lay  it  down  as  a  position  which  cannot  be  controverted, 
first,  that  the  agreement  of  ail  the  parts  of  a  story  does  not 
prove  that  story  to  be  true,  because  the  parts  may  agree,  and 
the  whole  may  be  false ;  secondly,  that  the  disagreement 
of  the  parts  of  a  story  proves  the  whole  c<mnot  he  true.  The 
agreement  does  not  prove  truth,  but  the  disagreement 
proves  falsehood  positively. 

The  history  of  Jesus  Christ  is  contained  in  the  four  books 
ascribed  to  Matthew,  Mark,  Luke  and  John.  The  first 
chapter  of  Matthew  begins  with  giving  a  genealogy  of 
Jesus  Christ ;  and  in  the  third  chapter  of  Luke  there  is 
given  a  genealogy  of  Jesus  Christ.  Did  these  two  agree,  it 
would  not  prove  the  genealogy  to  be  true,  because  it  might, 
nevertheless,  be  a  fabrication  ;  but  as  they  contradict  each 
other  in  every  particular,  it  proves  falsehood  absolutely. 
If  Matthew  speaks  truth,  Lute  speaks'  falsehood ;  and  if 
Luke  speaks  truth,  Matthew  speaks  falsehood  ;  and  as  there 
is  no  authority  for  believing  one  more  than  the  other,  there 
is  no  authority  for  believing  either ;  and  if  they  cannot  be 
believed  even  in  the  very  hrst  thing  they  say,  and  set  out 
to  prove,  they  are  not  entitled  to  be  believed  in  any  thing 
they  say  afterwards.  Truth  is  an  uniform  thing ;  and  as  to 


118 


THE   AGE   OF   BEASON. 


[PART  n. 


inspiration  and  revelation,  were  we  to  admit  it,  it  is  impos- 
sible to  suppose  it  can  be  contradictory.  Either  then  the  men 
called  apostles  are  impostors,  or  the  books  ascribed  to  them 
have  been  written  by  other  persons,  and  fathered  upon 
them,  as  is  the  case  with  the  Old  Testament. 

The  book  of  Matthew  gives,  chap.  i.  ver.  6,  a  genealogy 
by  name  from  David,  up  through  Joseph,  the  husband  of 
Mary,  to  Christ ;  and  makes  there  to  be  twenty-eight  gener- 
ations. The  book  of  Luke  gives  also  a  genealogy  by  name 
from  Christ,  through  Josepn,  the  husband  of  Mary,  down 
to  David,  and  makes  there  to  be  forty-three  generations  ; 
besides  which,  there  are  only  the  two  names  of  David 
and  Joseph  that  are  alike  in  the  two  lists.  I  here  insert 
both  genealogical  lists,  and  for  the  sake  of  perspicuity  and 
comparison,  have  placed  them  both  in  the  same  direction, 
that  is,  from  Joseph  down  to  David. 


Genealogy,  according  to 

Matthew. 

Christ 

2  Joseph 

3  Jacob 

4  Matthan 

5  Eleazer 

6  Eliud 

7  Achim 

8  Sadoc 

9  Azor 

10  Eliakim 

11  Abiud 

12  Zorobabel 

13  Salathiel 

14  Jecho^fts 

15  Josias 

16  Amon 

17  Manasses 

18  Ezekias 

19  Achaz 

20  Joatham 

21  Ozias 

22  Joram 

23  Josaphat 

24  Asa 


Genealogy,  according  to 
Luke. 

Christ 

2  Joseph 

3  Heli 

4  Matthat 

5  Levi 

6  Melchi 

7  Janna 

8  Joseph 

9  Mattathi&s 

10  Amos 

11  Naum 

12  Esli 

13  Nagge 

14  Maath 

15  Mattathiai 

16  Semei 

17  Joseph 

18  Juda 

19  Joanna 

20  Khesa 

21  Zorobabel 

22  Salathiel 

23  Neri 

24  Melchi 


FART  II.] 


THE   AGE   OF   REASON. 


119 


Genealogy,  according  to          Genealogy,  according  to 
Matthew.  Luke. 

26  Abia  26  Addi 

26  Roboam  26  Cosam 

27  Solomon  27  Elmodam 

28  David*  28  Er 

29  Jose 

30  Eliezer 

31  Jorim 

32  Matthat 

33  Levi 

34  Simeon 

35  Juda 

36  Joseph 

37  Jonan 

38  Elakim 

39  Melea 

40  Menan 

41  Mattatha 

42  Nathan 

43  David 

Now,  if  these  men,  Matthew  and  Luke,  set  out  with  a 
falsehood  between  them  (as  these  two  accounts  show  they 
do)  in  the  very  commencement  of  their  history  of  Jesus 
Christ,  and  of  whom,  and  of  what  he  was,  what  authority 
(as  I  have  before  asked)  is  there  left  for  believing  the 
strange  things  they  tell  us  afterwards  ?  If  they  cannot  be 
believed  in  tneir  account  of  his  natural  genealogy,  how  are 
we  to  believe  them,  when  they  tell  us,  he  was  the  son  of 
God,  begotten  by  a  ghost ;  and  that  an  angel  announced 
this  in  secret  to  his  mother  ?  If  they  lied  in  one  genealogy, 
why  are  we  to  believe  them  in  the  other  ?  If  his  natural  be 
manufactured,  which  it  certainly  is,  why  are  not  we  to  sup- 

*  From  the  birtl  of  David  to  the  birth  of  Christ  is  upwards  of  1080  years, 
•nd  as  the  life-time  of  Christ  is  not  included,  there  are  but  27  frill  genera 
tions.  To  find,  therefore,  the  average  of  each  person  mentioned  in  the  list, 
at  the  time  his  first  son  was  born,  it  is  only  necessary  to  divide  1080  by  27, 
which  gives  40  years  for  each  person.  As  the  life-time  of  man  was  then  but 
of  the  same  extent  it  is  now,  it  is  an  absurdity  to  suppose,  that  27  fol- 
lowing generations  should  all  be  old  bachelors,  before  they  married ;  and 
the  more  so,  when  we  are  told  that  Solomon,  the  next  in  succession  to 
David,  had  a  house  full  of  wives  and  mistresses  before  he  was  twenty-one 
yean  of  age.  So  far  from  this  genealogy  being  a  solemn  truth,  it  a  not 
even  a  reasonable  lie  The  list  of  Luke  gives  about  tw«nty-rix  years  forth* 
•verage  age,  and  this  ;.s  too  much. 


ISO  THE   AGE   OF   SEASON.  [PART  EL 

pose,  *hat  his  celestial  genealogy  is  manufactued  also ;  and 
that  the  whole  is  fabulous?  Can  any  man  of  serious  reflec 
tion  hazard  his  future  happiness  upon  the  belief  of  a  story 
naturally  impossible  ;  repugnant  to  every  idea  of  decency ; 
and  related  by  persons  already  detected  of  falsehood  ?  la 
it  not  more  sale  that  we  stop  ourselves  at  the  plain,  pure, 
and  unmixed  belief  of  one  God,  which  is  deism,  than  that 
we  commit  ourselves  on  an  ocean  of  improbable,  irrational, 
indecent  and  contradictory  tales  ? 

The  first  question,  however,  upon  the  books  of  the  New 
Testament,  as  upon  those  of  the  Old,  is,  are  they  genuine  ? 
Were  they  written  by  the  persons  to  whom  they  are  as- 
cribed? for  it  is  upon  this  ground  only,  that  the  strange 
things  related  therein  have  been  credited.  Upon  this  point, 
there  is  no  direct  proof  for  or  against;  and  all  that  this 
state  of  a  case  proves,  is  doubtfulness  /  and  doubtfulness  is 
the  opposite  of  belief.  The  state,  therefore,  that  the  books 
are  in,  proves  gainst  themselves,  as  far  as  this  kind  of 
proof  can  go. 

But,  exclus*  /e  of  this,  the  presumption  is,  that  the  books 
called  the  Evangelists,  and  ascribed  to  Matthew,  Mark, 
Luke  and  John,  were  not  written  by  Matthew,  Mark, 
Luke  and  John ;  and  that  they  are  impositions.  The  dis- 
ordered state  of  the  history  in  these  four  books,  the  silence 
of  one  book  upon  matters  related  in  the  other,  and  the  dis- 
agreement that  is  to  be  found  among  them,  implies,  that 
they  are  the  production  of  some  unconnected  individuals, 
many  years  after  the  things  they  pretend  to  relate,  each  of 
whom  made  his  own  legend ;  and  not  the  writings  of  men 
living  intimately  together,  as  the  men  called  apostles  are 
supposed  to  have  done :  in  fine,  that  they  have  been  manu- 
factured, as  the  books  of  the  Old  Testament  have  been,  by 
other  persons  than  those  whose  names  they  bear. 

The  story  of  the  angel  announcing,  what  the  church 
calls,  the  immaculate  conception,  is  not  so  much  as  men- 
tioned in  the  books  ascribea  to  Mark  and  John  ;  and  is  dif- 
ferently related  in  Matthew  and  Luke.  The  former  says, 
the  angel  appeared  to  Joseph ;  the  latter  says,  it  was  to 
Mary ;  but  either,  Joseph  or  Mary,  was  the  worst  evidence 
that  could  have  been  thought  of;  for  it  was  others  that 
should  have  testified  for  them,  and  not  they  for  themselves. 
Were  any  girl  that  is  now  with  child  to  say,  and  even  to 
swear  it,  that  she  was  gotten  with  child  by  a  ghost,  and 
that  an  angel  told  her  so,  would  she  be  beli*ved  ?  Certainly 


ll.J  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  12) 

she  would  not.  Why  then  are  wo  to  believe  the  same  thing 
of  another  girl  whom  we  never  saw,  told  by  nobody  knowg 
who,  nor  wnen,  nor  where  ?  How  strange  and  inconsistent 
is  it,  that  the  same  circumstance  that  would  weaken  the  be- 
lief even  of  a  probable  story,  should  be  given  as  a  motive 
for  believing  this  one,  that  has  upon  the  face  of  it  every 
token  of  absolute  impossibility  and  imposture. 

The  story  of  Herod  destroying  all  the  children  under 
two  years  old,  belongs  altogether  to  the  book  of  Matthew : 
not  one  of  the  rest  mentions  any  thing  about  it.  Had  such 
a  circumstance  been  true,  the  universality  of  it  must  have 
made  it  known  to  all  the  writers;  and  the  thing  would 
have  been  too  striking  to  have  been  omitted  bv  any.  This 
writer  tells  us,  that  Jesus  escaped  this  slaughter,  because 
Joseph  and  Mary  were  warned  by  an  angel  to  flee  with 
him  into  Egypt ;  but  he  forgot  to  make  any  provision  for 
John  who  was  then  under  two  years  of  age.  John,  how 
ever,  who  staid  behind,  fared  as  well  as  Jesus,  who  fled , 
and,  therefore,  the  story  circumstantially  belies  itself. 

Not  any  two  of  these  writers  agree  in  reciting,  exactly 
in  the  so/ine  wards,  the  written  inscription,  short  as  it  is, 
which  they  tell  us  was  put  over  Christ  when  he  was  cruci- 
fied ;  and  besides  this,  Mark  says,  He  was  crucified  at  the 
third  hour,  (nine  in  the  morning ;)  and  John  says  it  was 
the  sixth  hour,  (twelve  at  noon.*) 

The  inscription  is  thus  stated  in  those  books : 

Matthew — This  is  Jesus  the  king  of  the  Jews 

Mark The  king  of  the  Jews. 

Luke   This  is  the  king  of  the  Jews. 

John   Jesus  of  Nazareth  king  of  the  Jews. 

We  may  infer  from  these  circumstances,  trivial  as  they 
are,  that  those  writers,  whoever  they  were,  and  in  whatever 
time  they  lived,  were  not  present  at  the  scene.  The  only 
one  of  the  men,  called  apostles,  who  appears  to  have  been 
near  the  spot,  was  Peter,  and  when  he  was  accused  of  being 
one  of  Jesus'  followers,  it  is  said,  (Matthew,  chap.  xxvi.  ver. 
74,)  "  Then  Peter  leaan  to  curse  and  to  swear,  saying,  I 
know  not  the  man /  yet  we  are  now  called  upon  to  be- 
lieve the  same  Peter,  convicted,  by  their  own  account,  of 

•  According  to  John,  the  sentence  was  not  passed  till  about  th«  drtk 
•our,  (noon,)  and,  consequently,  the  execution  could  not  be  till  the  mfUr 
»oon ;  but  Mark  says  expressly,  that  he  was  crucified  at  the  third  ho«r 
(pine  in  the  morning,)  ehup.  XT.  2A  John  ihap.  jrix.  ver.  14. 


122  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  |  FAJtT  IL 

perjury.  For  what  reason,  or  on  what  authority,  shall  wo 
ao  this?  * 

The  accounts  that  are  given  of  the  circumstances,  that 
they  tell  us  attended  the  crucifixion,  are  differently  related 
in  those  four  books. 

The  book  ascribed  to  Matthew  says,  "  There  was  dark- 
ness war  all  the  land  from  the  sixth  hour  unto  the  ninth 
hour — that  the  veil  of  the  temple  was  rent  in  twain  from 
the  top  to  tlie  bottom — that  there  was  an  earthquake — that 
the  rocks  rent — that  the  graves  opened,  that  the  bodies  of 
many  of  the  saints  that  -slept  arose  and  came  out  of  their 
graves  after  the  resurrection,  and  went  into  the  holy  city 
and  appeared  unto  many"  Such  is  the  account  which 
this  dashing  writer  of  the  book  of  Matthew  gives ,  but  in 
which  he  is  not  supported  by  the  writers  of  the  other  books. 

The  writer  of  the  book  ascribed  to  Mark,  in  detailing  the 
circumstances  of  the  crucifixion,  makes  no  mention  of  any 
earthquake,  nor  of  the  rocks  rending,  nor  of  the  graves 
opening,  nor  of  the  dead  men  walking  out.  The  writer  of 
the  book  of  Luke  is  silent  also  upon  the  same  points.  And 
as  to  the  writer  of  the  book  of  John,  though  he  details  all 
the  circumstances  of  the  crucifixion  down  to  the  burial  of 
Christ,  he  says  nothing  about  either  the  darkness — the  veil 
of  the  temple — rthe  earthquake — the  rocks — the  graves — 
nor  the  dead  men. 

Now  if  it  had  been  true,  that  those  things  had  happened ; 
and  if  the  writers  of  these  books  had  lived  at  the  time  they 
did  happen,  and  had  been  the  persons  they  are  said  to  be, 
namely,  the  four  men  called  apostles,  Matthew,  Mark,  Luke 
and  John,  it  was  not  possible  for  them,  as  true  historians, 
even  without  the  aid  of  inspiration,  not  to  have  recorded 
them.  The  things,  supposing  them  to  have  been  facts,  were 
of  too  much  notoriety  not  to  have  been  known,  and  of  too 
much  importance  not  to  have  been  told.  All  these  sup- 
posed apostles  must  have  been  witnesses  of  the  earthquake, 
if  there  had  been  any ;  for  it  was  not  possible  for  them  to 
have  been  absent  from  it ;  the  opening  of  the  graves  an<? 
resurrection  of  the  dead  men,  and  their  walking  about  the 
city  is  of  greater  importance  than  the  earthquake.  An 
earthquake  is  always  possible,  and  natural,  and  proves 
nothing ;  but  this  opening  of  the  graves  is  supernatural, 
and  directly  in  point  to  their  doctrine,  their  cause,  and 
their  apostleship.  Had  it  been  true,  it  would  have  filled 
up  whole  chapters  of  those  books,  and  been  the  chosen 


PAJCT  II.]  THE   AOE   OF   REASON.  123 

theme  and  general  chorus  of  all  the  writers ;  but  instead  of 
this,  little  and  trivial  things,  and  mere  prattling  conversa- 
tion of,  Tie  said  this,  and  she  said  that,  are  often  teCriouslj 
detailed,  while  this  most  important  of  all,  had  it  been  true, 
is  passed  off  in  a  slovenly  manner  by  a  single  dash  of  the 
pen,  and  that  by  one  writer  only,  and  not  so  much  as  hinted 
at  by  the  rest. 

It  is  an  easy  thing  to  tell  a  lie,  but  it  is  difficult  to  sup 
port  the  lie  after  it  is  told.  The  writer  of  the  book  of  Mat 
thew  should  have  told  us  who  the  saints  were  that  came  to 
life  again,  and  went  into  the  city,  and  what  became  of  them 
afterwards,  and  who  it  was  that  saw  them ;  for  he  is  not 
hardy  enough  to  say  he  saw  them  himself;  whether  they 
came  out  naked,  and  all  in  natural  buff,  he-saints  and  she- 
saints  ;  or  whether  they  came  full  dressed,  and  wLere  they 
got  their  dresses ;  whether  they  went  to  their  former  habita- 
tions, and  reclaimed  their  wives,  their  husbands,  and  their 
property,  and  how  they  were  received;  whether  they  en- 
tered ejectments  for  the  recovery  of  their  possessions,  or 
brought  actions  of  crim.  con.  against  the  rival  interlopers ; 
whether  they  remained  on  earth,  and  followed  their  former 
occupation  of  preaching  or  working ;  or  whether  they  died 
again,  or  went  back  to  their  graves  alive,  and  buried 
themselves. 

Strange  indeed,  that  an  army  of  saints  should  return  to 
life,  and  nobody  know  who  they  were,  nor  who  it  was  that 
eaw  them,  and  that  not  a  word  more  should  be  said  upon 
the  subject,  nor  these  saints  have  any  thing  to  tell  us! 
Had  it  been  the  prophets  who  (as  we  are  told)  had  formerly 
prophesied  of  these  things,  they  must  have  had  a  great  deal 
to  say.  They  could  have  told  us  every  thing,  and  we  should 
have  had  posthumous  prophecies,  with  notes  and  commen- 
taries upon  the  first,  a  little  better  at  least  than  we  have 
now.  Had  it  been  Moses,  and  Aaron,  and  Joshua,  and 
Samuel,  and  David,  not  an  unconverted  Jew  had  remained 
in  all  Jerusalem.  Had  it  been  John  the  Baptist,  and  the 
saints  of  the  time  then  present,  every  body  would  have 
known  them,  and  they  would  have  out-preached  and  out- 
famed  all  the  other  apostles.  But,  instead  of  tbis,  these 
saints  are  made  to  pop  up,  like  Jonah's  gourd  in  the  night, 
for  no  purpose  at  all  but  to  wither  in  the  morning.  Thus 
much  for  this  part  of  the  story. 

The  tale  of  the  resurrection  follows  that  of  the  crucifix- 
ion  ;  and  in  this  as  well  as  in  that,  the  writers,  whoever  they 


124  THE    A.GE    OF   REASON  LPAVT  ft. . 

were,  disagree  so  much,  as  to  make  it  evident  that  none  of 
them  were  there. 

The  book  of  Matthew  states,  that  when  Christ  was  put  ia 
the  sepulchre,  the  Jews  applied  to  Pilate  for  a  watch  or  a 

fuard  to  be  placed  over  the  sepulchre,  to  prevent  the  body 
eing  stolen  by  the  disciples ;  and  that,  in  consequence  of 
this  request,  the  sepulchre  was  made  sure,  sealing  the  stont 
that  covered  the  mouth,  and  setting  a  watch.  But  the 
other  books  say  nothing  about  this  application,  nor  about 
the  sealing,  nor  the  guard,  nor  the  watch ;  and  according 
to  their  accounts,  therfe  were  none.  Matthew,  however, 
follows  up  this  part  of  the  story  of  the  guard  or  the  watch 
with  a  second  part,  that  I  shall  notice  in  the  conclusion,  as 
it  serves  to  detect  the  fallacy  of  those  books. 

The  book  of  Matthew  continues  its  account,  and  says, 
(chap,  xxviii.  ver.  1,)  that  at  the  end  of  the  Sabbath,  as  it 
began  to  dawn,  towards  the  first  day  of  the  week,  came 
Mary  Magdalene  and  the  other  Mary,  to  see  the  sepulchre, 
Mark  says  it  was  sun-rising,  and  John  says  it  was  dark. 
Luke  says  it  was  Mary  Magdalene  and  Joanna,  and  Mary 
the  mother  of  James,  and  other  women,  that  came  to  the 
sepulchre;  and  John  states  that  Mary  Magdalene  came 
alone.  So  well  do  they  agree  about  their  first  evidence ! 
they  all,  however,  appear  to  have  known  most  about  Mary 
Magdalene ;  she  was  a  woman  of  large  acquaintance,  and 
it  was  not  an  ill  conjecture  that  she  might  be  upon  the 
stroll. 

The  book  of  Matthew  goes  on  to  say,  (ver.  2,)  "  And  be- 
hold there  was  a  great  earthquake,  for  the  angel  of  the 
Lord  descended  from  heaven,  and  came  and  rolled  back  the 
Btone  from  the  door,  and  sat  upon  it."  But  the  other  books 
Bay  nothing  about  any  earthquake,  nor  about  the  angel 
rolling  back  the  stone,  and  sitting  upon  it ;  and,  according 
to  their  account,  there  was  no  angel  sitting  there.  Mark 
Bays  the  angel  was  within  the  sepulchre,  sitting  on  the  right 
side.  Luke  says  there  were  two,  and  they  were  both  stand- 
ing up ;  and  John  says  they  were  both  sitting  down,  one- 
at  the  head  and  the  other  at  the  feet. 

Matthew  says,  that  the  angel  th"at  was  sitting  upon  the 
stone  on  the  outside  of  the  sepulchre,  told  the  two  Marys 
that  Christ  was  risen,  and  that  the  women  went  away 
quickly.  Mark  says,  that  the  women,  upon  seeing  the 
itone  rolled  away,  and  wondering  at  it,  went  into  the  sep- 
ulchre, and  that  it  was  the  angel  that  was  sitting 


PABT  II. J  THE  AGE  OF  REASON.  12G 

on  the  right  side,  that  told  them  BO.  Luke  says,  it  was  the 
two  angels  that  were  standing  up ;  and  John  says,  it  was 
Jesus  Christ  himself  that  told  it  to  Mary  Magdalene ;  and 
that  she  did  not  go  into  the  sepulchre,  but  only  stooped 
down  and  looked  in. 

Now,  if  the  writers  of  these  four  books  had  gone  into  a 
eourt  of  justice  to  prove  an  alibi,  (for  it  is  of  the  nature  of 
an  alibi  that  is  here  attempted  to  be  proved,  namely,  the 
absence  of  a  dead  body  by  supernatural  means,)  and  had 
they  given  their  evidence  in  the  same  contradictory  mannei 
as  it  is  here  given,  they  would  have  been  in  danger  of  having 
their  ears  cropped  for  perjury,  and  would  have  justly  de- 
served it.  Yet  this  is  the  evidence,  and  these  are  the  books 
that  have  been  imposed  upon  the  world,  as  being  given 
by  divine  inspiration,  and  as  the  unchangeable  word  of 
God. 

The  writer  of  the  book  of  Matthew,  after  giving  this 
account,  relates  a  story  that  is  not  to  be  found  in  any  of 
the  other  books,  and  which  is  the  same  I  have  just  before 
alluded  to. 

"  Now,*  says  he,  (that  is,  after  the  conversation  the  wo- 
men had  had  with  the  angel  sitting  upon  the  stone,)  "  behold 
some  of  the  watch  (meaning  the  watch  that  he  had  said 
had  been  placed  over  the  sepulchre)  came  into  the  city, 
and  showed  unto  the  chief  priests  all  the  things  that  were 
done ;  and  when  they  were  assembled  with  the  elders  and 
had  taken  counsel,  they  gave  large  money  unto  the  soldiers, 
saying,  Say  ye,  that  his  disciples  came  by  night,  and  stole 
nim  away  while  we  slept  /  and  if  this  come  to  the  gover- 
nor's ears,  we  will  persuade  him,  and  secure  you.  So  thej 
took  the  money,  and  did  as  they  were  taught ;  and  thig, 
saying  (that  his  disciples  stole  him  away)  is  commonly  re- 
ported among  the  Jews  until  this  day." 

The  expression,  until  this  day,  is  an  evidence  that  the 
book  ascribed  to  Matthew  was  not  written  by  Matthew,  and 
that  it  has  been  manufactured  long  after  the  times  and 
things  of  which  it  pretends  to  treat ;  for  the  expression  im- 
plies a  great  length  of  intervening  time.  It  would  be  in- 
consistent in  us  to  speak  in  this  manner  of  any  thing  hap- 
r>9ning  in  our  own  time.  To  give,  therefore,  intelligible 
meaning  to  the  expression,  we  must  suppose  a  lapse  of 
some  generations  at  least,  for  this  manner  of  speaking  car- 
ries the  mind  back  to  anciei  t  time. 

The  absurdity  also  of  th«  story  is  worth  noticing ;  for  it 


126  THE  AGE   OF  REASON.  [PART  H 

shows  the  writer  of  the  book  of  Matthew  to  have  been  an 
exceedingly  weak  and  foolish  man.  He  tells  a  story  that 
contradicts  itself  in  point  of  possibility ;  for  though  the 
guard,  if  there  were  any,  might  be  made  to  say  that  the 
body  was  taken  away  while  they  were  asleep,  and  to  give 
that  as  a  reason  for  their  not  having  prevented  it,  that  same 
sleep  must  also  have  prevented  their  knowing  how,  and  by 
whom  it  was  done ;  and  yet  they  are  made  to  say,  that  it 
was  the  disciples  who  did  it.  Were  a  man  to  tender  his 
evidence  of  something  that  he  should  say  was  done,  and  of 
the  manner  of  doing  it,  and  of  the  person  MTho  did  it  while 
he  was  asleep,  and  could  know  nothing  of  the  matte-,  such 
evidence  could  not  be  received ;  it  will  do  well  enough  for 
Testament  evidence,  but  not  for  any  thing  where  truth  is 
concerned. 

I  come  now  to  that  part  of  the  evidence  in  those  books, 
that  respects  the  pretended  appearance  of  Christ  after  this 
pretended  resurrection. 

The  writer  of  the  book  of  Matthew  relates,  that  th% 
angel  that  was  sitting  on  the  stone  at  the  mouth  of  the  sep- 
ulchre, said  to  the  two  Marys,  chap,  xxviii.  ver.  7,  "  Be- 
hold Christ  is  gone  before  you  into  Galilee,  there  ye  shali 
see  him  ;  lo,  I  have  told  you."  And  the  same  writer  at  the 
next  two  verses,  (8,  9,)  makes  Christ  himself  to  speak  to 
the  same  purpose  to  these  women  immediately  after  the 
angel  had  told  it  to  them,  and  that  they  ran  quickly  to  tell 
it  to  the  disciples  ;  and  at  the  16th  verse  it  is  said,  "  Then 
the  eleven  disciples  went  a/way  into  Galilee,  into  a  mountain 
where  Jesus  had  appointed  them ;  and,  when  they  saw  him, 
they  worshipped  him." 

But  the  writer  of  the  book  of  John  tells  us  a  story  very- 
different  to  this ;  for  he  says,  chap.  xx.  ver.  19,  "  Then  the 
same  day  at  evening,  being  the  first  day  of  the  week,  (that 
is,  the  same  day  that  Christ  is  said  to  have  risen,)  when  th* 
doors  were  shut,  where  the  disciples  were  assembled,  for  fear 
of  the  Jews,  came  Jesus  ancfatood  in  the  midst  of  them." 

According  to  Matthew  the  eleven  were  marching  to 
Galilee,  to  meet  Jesus  in  a  mountain,  by  his  own  appoint- 
ment, at  the  very  time  when,  according  to  John,  they  were 
assembled  in  another  place,  and  that  not  by  appointment, 
out  in  secret,  for  fear  of  the  Jews. 

The  writer  of  the  book  of  Luke  contradicts  that  of  Mat 
thew  more  pointedly  than  John  does  ;  for  he  sajs  expressly, 
that  the  mee  :ng  was  in  Jerusalem  the  evening  of  the  same 


PART  H.]  THE  AGE  OF  REA8OK.  127 

day  that  he  (Christ)  rose,  and  that  the  eleven  were  there, 
See  Luke,  chap.  xxiv.  ver.  13,  33. 

Now,  it  is  not  p  >ssible,  unless  we  admit  these  supposed 
disciples  the  right  of  wilful  lying,  that  the  writer  of 
these  books  could  be  any  of  the  eleven  persons  called  dis- 
ciples; for  if,  according  to  Matthew,  the  eleven  went  into 
Galilee  to  meet  Jesus  m  a  mountain  by  his  own  appoint- 
ment, on  the  same  day  that  he  is  said  to  have  risen,  Luke 
and  John  must  have  been  two  of  that  eleven ;  yet  the 
writer  of  Luke  says  expressly,  and  John  implies  as  much, 
that  the  meeting  was  that  same  day,  in  a  house  in  Jerusa- 
lem ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  if,  according  to  Luke  and 
John,  the  eleven  were  assembled  in  a  house  in  Jerusalem, 
Matthew  must  have  been  one  of  that  eleven  ;  yet  Matthew 
says  the  meeting  was  in  a  mountain  in  Galilee,  and  conse- 
quently the  evidence  given  in  those  books  destroys  each 
other. 

The  writer  of  the  book  of  Mark  says  nothing  about  any 
meeting  in  Galilee ;  but  he  says,  chap.  xvi.  ver.  12,  that 
Christ,  after  his  resurrection,  appeared  in  another  form  to 
two  of  them,  as  they  walked  into  the  country,  and  that 
these  two  told  it  to  the  residue,  who  would  not  believe 
them.  Luke  also  tells  a  story,  in  which  he  keeps  Christ 
employed  the  whole  of  the  day  of  this  pretended  resurrec- 
tion, until  the  evening,  and  which  totally  invalidates  the 
account  of  going  to  the  mountain  in  Galilee.  He  says,  that 
two  of  them,  without  saying  which  two,  went  that  same 
day  to  a  village  called  Emtnans,  threescore  furlongs  (seven 
miles  and  a  half)  from  Jerusalem,  and  that  Christ,  in  dis- 
guise, went  with  them,  and  staid  with  them  unto  the  even- 
ing, and  supped  with  them,  and  then  vanished  out  of  their 
eight,  and  re-appeared  that  same  evening  at  the  meeting 
of  the  eleven  in  Jerusalem. 

This  is  the  contradictory  manner  in  which  the  evidence 
of  this  pretended  re-appearance  of  Christ  is  stated;  the  only- 
point  in  which  the  writers  agree,  ifi  the  skulking  privacy 
of  that  re-appearance ;  for  whether  it  was  in  the  recess  of  a 
mountain  in  Galilee,  or  in  a  shut-up  house  in  Jerusalem,  it 
was  still  skulking.  To  what  cause  then  are  we  to  assign 
this  skulking?  On  the  one  hand,  it  is  directly  repugnant 
to  the  supposed  or  pretended  end — that  of  convincing  the 
world  that  Christ  was  risen ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  to 
have  asserted  the  publicity  of  it,  would  have  exposed  the 
writers  of  those  books  to  public  detection,  and,  therefore, 


128  THE    AGE   OF   REASON.  [PABT  ft. 

they  have  been  under  the  necessity  of  making  it  a  private 
affair. 

As  to  the  account  of  Christ  being  seen  by  more  than  five 
hundred  at  once,  it  is  Pau.  only  who  says  it>  and  not  the 
five  hundred  who  say  it  for  themselves.  It  is,  therefore, 
the  testimony  of  but  one  man,  and  that  too  of  a  man,  who 
did  not,  according  to  the  same  account,  believe  a  word  of 
the  matter  himself,  at  the  time  it  is  said  to  have  happened. 
His  evidence,  supposing  him  to  have  been  the  writer  of  the 
15th  chapter  of  Corinthians,  where  this  account  is  given,  is 
like  that  of  a  man  who  comes  into  a  court  of  justice  to 
swear,  that  what  he  had  sworn  before  is  false.  A  man  may 
often  see  reason,  and  he  has,  too,  always  the  right  of  chang- 
ing his  opinion ;  but  this  liberty  does  not  extend  to  matters 
of  fact. 

I  now  come  to  the  last  scene,  that  of  the  ascension  into 
heaven.  Here  all  fear  of  the  Jews,  and  of  every  thing  else, 
must  necessarily  have  been  out  of  the  question :  it  was  that 
which,  if  true,  was  to  seal  the  whole ;  and  upon  which  the 
reality  of  the  future  mission  of  the  disciples  was  to  rest  for 
proof.  "Words,  whether  declarations  or  promises,  that  passed 
in  private,  either  in  the  recess  of  a  mountain  in  Galilee,  or 
in  a  shut-up  house  in  Jerusalem,  even  supposing  them  to 
have  been  spoken,  could  not  be  evidence  in  public ;  it  was 
therefore  necessary  that  this  last  scene  should  preclude  the 
possibility  of  denial  and  dispute ;  and  that  it  should  be,  as  I 
have  stated  in  the  former  part  of  the  Age  of  Reason^  as  pub- 
lic and  as  visible  as  the  sun  at  noon-day :  at  least  it  ought  to 
have  been  as  public  as  the  crucifixion  is  reported  to  have 
been.  But  to  come  to  the  point. 

In  the  first  place,  the  writer  of  the  book  of  Matthew  does 
not  say  a  syllable  about  it ;  neither  does  the  writer  of  the 
book  of  John.  This  being  the  case,  is  it  possible  to  suppose 
that  those  writers,  who  affect  to  be  even  minute  in  other 
matters,  would  have  been  silent  upon  this,  had  it  been  true? 
The  writer  of  the  book  of  Mark  passes  it  off  in  a  careless, 
slovenly  manner,  with  a  single  dash  of  the  pen,  as  if  he  was 
tired  of  romancing,  or  ashamed  of  the  story.  So  also  does 
the  writer  of  Luke.  And  even  between  these  two,  there  is 
not,  an  apparent  agreement,  as  to  the  place  where  this  final 
parting  is  said  to  have  been. 

The  book  of  Mark  says  that  Christ  appeared  to-the  eleven 
as  they  sat  at  meat ;  alluding  to  the  meeting  of  the  eleven 
at  Jerusalem :  he  then  states  the  conversation  that  he  say 


PAST  II.]  THE  AGE  OF  SEASON.  129 

passed  at  that  meeting ;  and  immediately  after  says,  (as  a 
school-boy  would  finish  a  dull  story,)  "  So  then,  after  the 
Lord  had  spoken  unto  them,  he  was  received  up  into 
heaven,  and  sat  on  the  right  hand  of  God."  But  the  writer 
of  Luke  says,  that  the  ascension  was  from  Bethany ;  that 
he  (Christ)  led  them  out  as  far  as  Bethany,  and  was  parted 
from  them  there,  and  was  carried  up  into  heaven.  So  also 
was  Mahomet :  and,  as  to  Moses,  the  apostle  Jude  savs,  ver. 
9,  That  Michael  and  the  devil  disputed  about  his  body. 
While  we  believe  such  fables  as  these,  or  either  of  them, 
we  believe  unworthily  of  the  Almighty. 

I  have  now  gone  through  the  examination  of  the  four 
books  ascribed  to  Matthew,  Mark,  Luke  and  John ;  and 
when  it  is  considered  that  the  whole  space  of  time  from  the 
crucifixion  to  what  is  called  the  ascension,  is  but  a  few  days, 
apparently  not  more  than  three  or  four,  and  that  all  the  cir- 
cumstances are  said  to  have  happened  nearly  about  the 
same  spot,  Jerusalem ;  it  is,  I  believe,  impossible  to  find,  in 
any  story  upon  record,  so  many  and  such  glaring  absurdi- 
ties, contradictious,  and  falsehoods,  as  are  in  those  books. 
They  are  more  numerous  and  striking  than  I  had  any  ex- 

Eectation  of  finding,  whe.ii  I  began  this  examination,  and 
ir  more  so  than  I  had  any  idea  of  when  I  wrote  the  former 
part  of  the  Age  of  Reason.  I  had  then  neither  Bible  nor 
Testament  to  refer  to,  nor  could  I  procure  any.  My  own 
bituation,  even  as  to  existence,  was  becoming  every  day 
more  precarious ;  and  as  I  was  willing  to  leave  something 
behind  me  upon  the  subject,  I  was  obliged  to  be  quick  ana 
concise.  The  quotations  I  then  made  were  from  memory- 
only,  but  they  are  correct;  and  the  opinions  I  have  ad- 
vanced in  that  work  are  the  effect  of  the  most  clear  and 
long-established  conviction,  that  the  Bible  and  the  Testa- 
ment are  impositions  upon  the  world,  that  the  fall  of  man, 
the  account  of  Jesus  Christ  being  the  Son  of  God,  and  of 
his  dying  to  appease  the  wrath  of  God,  and  of  salvation  by 
that  strange  means,  are  all  fabulous  inventions,  dishonour- 
able to  the  wisdom  and  power  of  the  Almighty — that  the 
only  true  religion  is  Deism,  by  which  I  then  meant,  and 
now  mean,  the  belief  of  one  God,  and  an  imitation  of  his 
moral  character,  or  the  practice  of  what  are  called  moral 
virtues — and  that  it  was  upon  this  only  (so  far  as  religion  is 
concerned)  that  I  rested  all  my  hopes  of  happiness  hereafter. 
So  eay  I  now — and  so  help  me  God. 

But  to  return  to  the  subject. — Though  it  is  impossible, 
9 


180  THE  AGE  OF  REASON.  [PART  D, 

at  this  distance  of  time,  to  ascertain  as  a  fact  who  were  the 
writers  of  those  four  books  (and  this  alone  is  sufficient  to 
hold  them  in  doubt,  and  where  we  doubt  we  do  not  believe) 
it  is  not  difficult  to  ascertain  negatively  that  they  were  not 
written  by  the  persons  to  whom  they  are  ascribed.  The 
contradictions  in  those  books  demonstrate  two  things : 

First,  that  the  writers  cannot  have  been  eye-witnesses 
and  ear-witnesses  of  the  matters  they  relate,  or  they  would 
have  related  them  without  those  contradictions ;  and,  con' 
eequently,  that  the  books  have  not  been  written  by  the  per- 
sons called  apostles,  who  are  supposed  to  have  been  witnesses 
of  this  kind. 

Secondly,  that  the  writers,  whoever  they  were,  have  not 
acted  in  concerted  imposition,  but  each  writer  separately 
and  individually  for  himself,  and  without  the  knowledge  of 
the  ociier. 

The  same  evidence  that  applies  to  prove  the  one,  applieb 
equally  to  prove  both  cases ;  that  is,  that  the  books  were 
not  written  by  the  men  called  apostles,  and  also  that  they 
are- not  a  concerted  imposition.  As  to  inspiration,  it  is  al- 
together out  of  the  question ;  we  may  as  well  attempt  to 
unite  truth  and  falsehood,  as  inspiration  and  contradiction. 

If  four  men  are  eye-witnesses  and  ear-witnesses  to  a 
scene,  they  will,  without  any  concert  between  them,  agree 
as  to  time  and  place,  when  and  where  that  scene  happened. 
Their  individual  knowledge  of  the  thing,  each  one  knowing 
it  for  himself,  renders  concert  totally  unnecessary  ;  the  one 
will  not  say  it  was  in  a  mountain  in  the  country,  and  the 
other  at  a  house  in  town :  the  one  will  not  say  it  was  at 
sun-rise,  and  the  other  that  it  was  dark.  For  in  whatever 
place  it  <vas,  at  whatever  time  it  was,  they  know  it  equally 
alike. 

And,  on  the  other  hand,  if  four  men  concert  a  story,  they 
will  make  their  separate  relations  of  that  story  agree,  and 
corroborate  with  each  other  to  support  the  whole.  That 
concert  supplies  the  want  of  fact  in  the  one  case,  as  the 
knowledge  of  the  fact  supersedes,  in  the  other  case,  the 
necessity  of  a  concert.  The  same  contradictions,  therefore, 
that  prove  there  has  been  no  concert,  prove,  also,  that  the 
reporters  had  no  knowledge  of  the  fact,  (or  rather  of  that 
which  they  relate  as  a  fact,)  and  detect  also  the  falsehood 
of  their  reports.  Those  booKs,  therefore,  have  neither  been 
written  by  the  men  called  apostles,  nor  by  impostors  in 
concert.  How  then  have  they  been  written  ? 


PJLBT  H.]  THE   AGE   OF    REASOF.  131 

I  am  not  one  of  those  who  are  fond  of  believing  there  ii 
much  of  that  which  is  called  wilful  lying,  or  lying  original- 
ly ;  except  in  the  case  of  men  setting  up  to  be  prophets,  aa 
in  the  Old  Testament :  for  prophesying  is  lying  profession- 
ally. In  almost  all  other  cases,  it  is  not  difficult  to  discover 
the  progress,  by  which  even  simple  supposition,  with  the 
aid  of  credulity,  will,  in  time,  grow  into  a  lie,  and  at  last  be 
told  as  a  fact ;  and  whenever  we  can  find  a  charitable  rea- 
son for  a  thing  of  this  kind,  we  ought  not  to  indulge  a 
severe  one. 

The  story  of  Jesus  Christ  appearing  after  he  was  dead, 
is  the  story  of  an  apparition,  such  as  timid  imaginations  can 
always  create  in  vision,  and  credulity  believe.  Stories  of 
this  kind  had  been  told  of  the  assassination  of  Julius  Caesar, 
not  many  years  before,  and  they  generally  have  their  origin 
in  violent  deaths,  or  in  the  execution  of  innocent  persons. 
In  cases  of  this  kind,  compassion  lends  its  aid,  and  benevo- 
lenfly  stretches  the  story.  It  goes  on  a  little  and  a  little 
further,  till  it  becomes  a  a  most  certain  truth.  Once  start 
a  ghost,  and  credulity  fills  up  the  history  of  its  life  and 
assigns  the  cause  of  its  appearance !  one  tells  it  one  way, 
another  another  way,  till  there  are  as  many  stories  about 
the  ghost  and  about  the  proprietor  of  the  ghost,  as  there  are 
about  Jesus  Christ  in  these  four  books. 

The  story  of  the  appearance  of  Jesus  Christ  is  told  with 
that  strange  mixture  of  the  natural  and  impossible,  that 
distinguishes  legendary  tale  from  fact.  He  is  represented 
as  suoaenly  coming  in  and  going  out  when  the  doors  are 
shut,  and  of  vanishing  out  of  sight,  and  appearing  again,  as 
one  would  conceive  of  an  unsubstantial  vision ;  then  again 
he  is  hungry,  sits  down  to  meat,  and  eats  his  supper.  IBut 
as  those  who  tell  stories  of  this  kind,  never  provide  for  all 
the  cases,  so  it  is  here :  they  have  told  us,  that  when  he 
arose  he  left  his  grave-clothes  behind  him  ;  but  they  have 
forgotten  to  provide  other  clothes  for  him  to  appear  in 
afterwards,  or  tell  to  us  what  he  did  with  them  when  he 
ascended ;  whether  he  stripped  all  off,  or  went  up  clothes 
and  all.  In  the  case  of  Elijah,  they  have  been  careful 
enough  to  make  him  throw  down  his  mantle ;  how  it  hap- 
pened not  to  be  burnt  in  the  chariot  of  fire,  they  also  have 
not  told  us.  But  as  imagination  supplies  all  deficiencies  of 
this  kind,  we  may  suppose  if  we  please,  that  it  was  made 
of  salamander's  wool. 

Those  who  are  not  much  acquainted  with  ecclesiastical 


182  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  [PAJtT  IL 

history,  may  suppose  that  the  book  called  the  New  Testa* 
ment  has  existed  ever  since  the  time  of  Jesus  Christ,  as  they 
suppose  that  the  books  ascribed  to  Moses  have  existed  ever 
since  the  time  of  Moses.  But  the  fact  is  historically  other 
wise ;  there  was  no  such  b9ok  as  the  New  Testament  tiK 
more  than  three  hundred  years  after  the  time  that  Christ  ia 
said  to  have  lived. 

At  what  time  the  books  ascribed  to  Matthew,  Mark, 
Luke  and  John,  began  to  appear,  is  altogether  a  matter  of 
uncertainty.  There  is  not  the  least  shadow  of  evidence  of 
who  the  persons  were  that  wrote  them,  nor  at  what  time 
they  were  written ;  and  they  might  as  well  have  been  called 
by  the  names  of  any  of  the  other  supposed  apostles,  as  by 
the  names  they  are  now  called.  The  originals  are  not  in 
the  possession  of  any  Christian  Church  existing,  any  more 
than  the  two  "tables  of  stone  written  on,  they  pretend,  by 
the  finger  of  God,  upon  Mount  Sinai,  and  given  to  Moses, 
are  in  the  possession  of  the  Jews.  And  even  if  they  were, 
there  is  no  possibility  of  proving  the  handwriting  in  either 
case.  At  the  time  those  books  were  written  there  was  no 
printing,  and  consequently  there  could  be  no  publication, 
otherwise  than  by  written  copies,  which  any  man  might 
make  or  alter  at  pleasure,  and  call  them  originals.  Cau 
we  suppose  it  is  consistent  with  the  wisdom  of  the  Al- 
mighty, to  commit  himself  and  his  will  to  man,  "upon  such 
precarious  means  as  these,  or  that  it  is  consistent  we  should 
pin  our  faith  upon  such  uncertainties?  We  cannot  make 
nor  alter,  nor  even  imitate  so  much  as  one  blade  of  grass 
that  he  has  made,  and  yet  we  can  make  or  alter  words  of 
God  as  easily  as  words  of  man.* 

About  three  hundred  and  fifty  years  after  the  time  that 
Christ  is  said  to  have  lived,  several  writings  of  the  kind  I 
am  speaking  of,  were  scattered  in  the  hands  of  divers  indi- 
riduals ;  and  as  the  church  had  begun  to  form  itself  into  an 

*  The  former  part  of  the  Age  of  Reaton  has  not  been  published  two  years, 
and  there  is  already  an  expression  in  it  that  is  not  mine.  The  expression  is : 
The  book  of  Luke  was  carried  by  a  majority  of  one  voice  only.  It  may  be  true, 
but  it  is  not  I  that  have  said  it.  Some  person  who  might  know  the  circum- 
stance, has  added  it  in  a  note  at  the  bottom  of  the  page  of  some  of  the  edi- 
tions, printed  either  in  England  or  in  America  ;  and  the  printers,  after  that, 
have  erected  it  into  the  body  of  the  work,  and  made  me  the  author  of  it. 
If  this  has  happened  witkin  such  a  short  space  of  time,  notwithstanding  th« 
aid  of  printing,  which  prevents  the  alteration  of  copies  individually ;  what 
may  not  have  happened  in  much  greater  length  of  time,  when  there  w»a  no 
printing,  and  when  any  man  who  could  write  could  make  a  written  copy 
»t»i  call  it  an  original,  by  Matthew,  Mark,  Ltuce,  and  John. 


PAJTT  II.]  THE   AGE   OF  SEASON.  138 

hierarchy,  or  church  government,  with  temporal  powers,  it 
sei  itself  about  collecting  them  into  a  code,  as  we  now  see 
them,  called  The  New  Testament.  They  decided  by  vote, 
as  1  have  before  said  in  the  former  part  of  the  Age  of  Rear 
son,  which  of  those  writings,  out  of  the  collection  they  had 
made,  should  be  the  word  of  God,  and  which  should  not. 
The  Rabbins  of  the  Jews  had  decided,  by  vote,  upon  the 
books  of  the  Bible  before. 

As  the  object  of  the  church,  as  is  the  case  in  all  national 
establishments  of  churches,  was  power  and  revenue,  and 
terror  the  means  it  used :  it  is  consistent  to  suppose,  that  the 
most  miraculous  and  wonderful  of  the  writings  they  had 
collected  stood  the  best  chance  of  being  voted.  And  as  to 
the  authenticity  of  the  books,  the  vote  stands  in  the  place  of 
it ;  for  it  can  be  traced  no  higher. 

Disputes,  however,  ran  high  among  the  people  then 
calling  themselves  Christians ;  not  only  as  to  points  of  doc- 
trine, but  as  to  the  authenticity  of  the  books.  In  the  con- 
test between  the  persons  called  St.  Augustine  and  Fauste, 
about  the  year  400,  the  latter  says,  "  The  books  called  th« 
Evangelists  have  been  composed  long  after  the  times  of  the 
aposfles,  by  some  obscure  men,  who,  fearing  that  the  world 
would  not  give  credit  to  their  relation  of  matters  of  which 
they  could  not  be  informed,  have  published  them  under 
the  names  of  the  apostles ;  and  which  are  so  full  of  sottish- 
ness  and  discordant  relations,  that  there  is  neither  agree- 
ment nor  connection  between  them." 

And  in  another  place,  addressing  himself  to  the  advo- 
cates of  those  books,  as  being  the  word  of  God,  he  says, 
"It  is  thus  that  your  predecessors  have  inserted  in  the 
scriptures  of  our  Lord,  many  things,  which  though  they 
carry  his  name,  agree  not  with  his  doctrines.  This  is  not 
Burp  rising,  since  that  we  ha.ve  of  ten  proved  that  these  things 
have  not  been  written  by  himself,  nor  by  his  apostles,  but 
that  for  the  greatest  part  they  are  founded  upon  tales,  upon 
vague  reports,  and  put  together  by  I  know  not  what,  half 
Jews,  with  but  little  agreement  between  them  ;  and  which 
they  have  nevertheless  published  under  the  names  of  the 
apostles  of  our  Lord,  and  have  thus  attributed  to  them 
their  own  errors  and  their  lies"* 

The  reader  will  see  by  these  extracts,  that  the  authen- 

*  I  have  taken  these  two  extracts  from  Boulanger*s  Life  of  Paul,  written 
\n  French ;  Boulanger  has  quoted  them  from  the  wntingn  of  Augustiuf 
against  Faaste.  to  which  he  refer*. 


184  THE  AGE  OF   REASON.  [FAST  O. 

ticity  of  the  books  of  the  New  Testament  was  denied,  ana 
and  the  books  treated  as  tales,  forgeries  and  lies,  at  the 
time  they  were  voted  to  be  the  word  of  God.  But  the  in- 
terest of  the  church,  with  the  assistance  of  the  faggot,  bore 
down  the  opposition,  and  at  last  suppressed  all  investiga- 
tion. Miracles  followed  upon  miracles,  if  we  will  believe 
them,  £.nd  men  were  taught  to  say  they  believed  whether 
they  believed  or  not.  But  (by  way  of  throwing  :n  a 
thought)  the  French  Revolution  has  excommunicated  the 
church  from  the  power  of  working  miracles ;  she  has  not 
been  able,  with  the  assistance  of  ail  her  saints,  to  work  one 
miracle  since  the  revolution  began ;  and  as  she  never  stood 
in  greater  need  than  now,  we  may,  without  the  aid  of  divin- 
ation, conclude  that  all  her  former  miracles  were  tricks, 
and  lies.* 

When  we  consider  the  lapse  of  more  than  three  hun- 
dred years  intervening  between  the  time  that  Christ  is  said 
to  have  lived  and  the  time  the  New  Testament  was  formed 
into  a  book,  we  must  see,  even  without  the  assistance  of 
historical  evidence,  the  exceeding  uncertainty  there  is  of 
its  authenticity.  The  authenticity  of  the  book  of  Homer, 
so  far  as  regards  the  authorship,  is  much  better  established 
than  that  of  the  New  Testament,  though  Homer  is  a  thou- 
sand years  the  most  ancient.  It  was  only.an  exceeding  good 

*  Boulanger  in  his  life  of  Paul,  has  collected  from  the  ecclesiastical  his- 
tories, and  the  writings  of  the  fathers  as  they  are  called,  several  matters 
which  show  the  opinions  that  prevailed  among  the  different  sects  of  Chris- 
tians, at  the  time  the  Testament,  as  we  now  see  it,  was  voted  to  be  tue 
word  of  God.  The  following  extracts  are  from  the  second  chapter  of  that 
work: 

"  The  Marcionists,  (a  Christian  sect,)  assured  that  the  evangelists  were 
filled  with  falsities.  The  Manichaas,  who  formed  a  very  numerous  sect  at 
the  commencement  of  Christianity,  rejected  as  false,  all  the  New  Testament ; 
and  showed  other  writings  quite  different  that  they  gave  for  authentic. 
The  Corinthians,  like  the  Marcionists,  admitted  not  the  Acts  of  the  Apos  • 
ties.  The  Encratites,  and  the  Sevenians,  adopted  neither  the  Acts  «cr  th« 
Epistles  of  Paul.  Chrysostom,  in  a  homily  which  he  made  upon  vh*  Act* 
of  the  Apostles,  says,  that  in  his  time,  about  the  year  400,  many  p-w^le 
knew  nothing  either  of  the  author  or  of  the  book.  St.  Irene,  who  lived  he- 
fore  that  time,  reports  that  the  Valentinians,  like  several  other  sects  of  the 
Christians,  accused  the  scriptures  of  being  filled  with  imperfections,  error« 
and  contradictions.  The  Ebionites  or  Nazarenes,  who  were  the  first  Chris- 
tians, rejected  all  the  Epistles  of  Paul,  and  regarded  him  as  an  impostor. 
They  report  among  other  things,  that  he  was  originally  a  Pagan,  that  he 
eame  to  Jerusalem,  where  he  lived  some  time ;  and  that  having  a  tjind  to 
marry  the  daughter  of  the  high  priest,  he  caused  himself  to  be  circivicised  ; 
but  that  not  being  able  to  obtain  her,  he  quarrelled  with  the  J«  »s,  and 
wrote  against  circumcision,  and  against  the  observation  of  the  Sabbi  Ji,  *n4 
Against  all  the  legal  ordinance  " 


PAST  H.]  THE  AGE  OF  REASON.  135 

poet  that  could  have  written  the  book  of  Homer,  and, 
therefore,  few  men  only  could  have  attempted  it;  and  a 
man  capable  of  doing  it  would  not  have  thrown  away  his  own 
fame  by  giving  it  to  another.  In  like  manner,  there  were 
but  few  that  could  have  compose  Euclid's  Elements,  be- 
cause none  but  an  exceeding  good  geometrician  could  hare 
been  the  author  of  that  work. 

But  with  respect  to  the  books  of  the  New  Testament, 
particularly  such  parts  as  tell  us  of  the  resurrection  and  as- 
cension of  Christ,  any  person  who  could  tell  a  story  of  an 
apparition,  or  of  a  man's  walking,  could  have  made  such 
books ;  for  the  story  is  most  wretchedly  told.  The  chance, 
therefore,  of  forgery  in  the  Testament,  is  millions  to  one 
greater  than  in  the  case  of  Homer  or  Euclid.  Of  the  nu- 
merous priests  or  parsons  of  the  present  day,  bishops  and 
all,  every  one  of  them  can  make  a  sermon,  or  translate  a 
scrap  of  Latin,  especially  if  it  has  been  translated  a  thousand 
times  before ;  but  is  there  any  amongst  them  that  can  write 
poetry  like  Homer,  of  science  like  Euclid.;  the  sum  total 
of  a  parson's  learning,  with  very  few  exceptions,  is  a  b  db, 
and  nic,  hcec,  hoc  /  and  their  knowledge  of  science  is  three 
times  one  is  three ;  and  this  is  more  than  sufficient  to  have 
enabled  them,  had  they  lived  at  the  time,  to  have  written 
all  the  books  of  the  New  Testament. 

As  the  opportunities  of  forgeries  were  greater,  so  also 
was  the  inducement.  A  man  could  gain  no  advantage  by 
writing  under  the  name  of  Homer  or  Euclid ;  if  he  could 
write  equal  to  them,  it  would  be  better  that  he  wrote  under 
his  own  name ;  if  inferior,  he  could  not  succeed.  Pride 
would  prevent  the  former,  and  impossiblity  the  latter.  Bu 
with  respect  to  such  books  as  compose  the  New  Testamenv 
all  the  inducements  were  on  the  side  of  forgery.  The  best 
imagined  history  that  could  have  been  made,  at  the  distance 
of  two  or  three  hundred  years  after  the  time,  could  not 
have  passed  for  an  original  under  the  name  of  the  real 
writer ;  the  only  chance  of  success  lay  in  forgery,  for  the 
church  wanted  pretence  for  its  new  doctrine,  and  truth  and 
talents  were  out  of  the  question. 

But  as  it  is  not  uncommon  (as  before  observed)  to  relate 
stories  of  person  walking  after  they  are  dead,  and  of  ghosta 
and  apparitions  of  such  as  have  fallen  by  some  violent  or 
extraordinary  means ;  and  as  the  people  of  that  day  were 
in  the  habit  of  believing  such  things,  and  of  the  appearance 
>f  angels,  and  also  of  devils  and  of  their  getting  into  peo- 


186  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  [PART  U 

pie's  insides,  and  shaking  them  lik^  a  fit  of  an  ague,  and 
of  their  being  cast  out  again  as  if  by  an  emetic — (Marj 
Magdalene,  the  book  of  Mark  tells  us,  had  brought  up,  or 
been  brought  to  bed  of  seven  devils ;)  it  was  nothing  ex 
traordinary  that  some  story  of  this  kind  should  get  abroad 
of  the  person  called  Jesus  Christ,  and  become  afterwards 
the  foundation  of  the  four  books  ascribed  to  Matthew, 
Mark,  Luke,  and  John.  Each  writer  told  the  tale  as  he 
heard  it,  or  thereabouts,  and  gave  to  his  book  the  name  of 
the  saint  or  the  apostle  whom  tradition  had  given  as  the 
eye-witness.  It  is  only  upon  this  ground  that  the  contradic- 
tion in  those  books  can  be  accounted  for ;  arid  if  this  be 
not  the  case,  they  are  downright  impositions,  lies  and  for 
geries,  without  even  the  apology  of  credulity. 

That  they  have  been  written  by  a  sort  of  half  Jews,  as 
the  foregoing  quotations  mention,  is  discernable  enough 
The  frequent  references  made  to  that  chief  assassin  and  im- 
postor Moses,  and  the  two  men  called  prophets,  establishes 
this  point;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  the  church  has  compli- 
mented the  fraud,  by  admitting  the  Bible  and  the  Testa- 
ment to  reply  to  each  other.  Between  the  Christian  Jew 
and  the  Christian  Gentile,  the  thing  called  a  prophecy,  and 
the  thing  prophesied  ;  the  type  and  the  thing  typified ;  the 
sign  and  the  thing  signified,  have  been  industriously  rum- 
maged up,  and  fitted  together  like  old  locks  and  pick-lock 
keys.  The  story  foolishly  enough  told  of  Eve  and  the  ser- 
pent, and  naturally  enough  as  to  the  enmity  between  men 
and  serpents,  (for  the  serpent  always  bites  about  the  heel, 
because  it  cannot  reach  higher ;  and  the  man  always  knocks 
the  serpent  about  the  head,  as  the  most  effectual  way  to 
prevent  its  biting  ;*)  this  foolish  story,  I  say,  has  been 
made  into  a  prophecy,  a  type,  and  a  promise  to  begin  with ; 
and  the  lying  imposition  of  Isaiah  to  Ahaz,  That  a  virgin 
thalt  conceive  and  bear  a  son,  as  a  sign  that  Ahaz  should 
conquer,  when  the  event  was  that  he  was  defeated,  (as  al- 
Veady  noticed  in  the  observations  on  the  book  of  Isaiah,) 
has  been  perverted  and  made  to  serve  as  a  winder-up. 

Jonah  and  the  whale  are  almost  made  into  a  sign  or  a 
type.  Jonah  is  Jesus,  and  the  whale  is  the  grave ;  for  it  is 
said,  (and  they  have  made  Christ  to  say  it  of  nimself,)  Matt, 
chap.  xii.  ver.  40,  "  For  as  Jonah  was  three  days  and  thre* 
nights  in  the  whale's  belly,  so  shall  the  Son  of  man  be  thre* 

*  "  It  shall  bruise  thy  head,  and  thy r   »halt  bruiM  hii  httL"     f Jeneak, 
p.  iii.  ver.  15. 


PAST  n.]  THE  AGB  OF  BEASOK.  18? 

days  and  three  nights  in  the  heart  of  the  earth."  But  it 
happens,  awkwardly  enough,  that  Christ,  according  to  their 
own  account,  was  but  one  day  and  two  nights  in  the  grave ; 
about  36  hours  instead  of  72 ;  that  is,  the  Friday  night, 
the  Saturday,  and  the  Saturday  night;  for  they  say 
he  was  up  on  the  Sunday  morning  by  sunrise,  or  before. 
Bat  as  mis  fits  quite  as  well  as  the  bite  and  the  kick  in 
Genesis,  or  the  virgin  and  her  son  in  Isaiah,  it  will  pass  in 
the  lump  of  orthodox  things.  Thus  much  for  the  historical 
part  of  the  Testament  and  its  evidences. 

Epistles  of  Paul. — The  epistles  ascribed  to  Paul,  being 
fourteen  in  number,  almost  nil  up  the  remaining  part  of  the 
Testament.  Whether  those  epistles  were  written  by  the 
person  to  whom  they  are  ascribed,  is  a  matter  of  no  great 
importance,  since  the  writer,  whoever  he  was,  attempts  to 
prove  his  doctrine  by  argument.  He  does  not  pretend  tc 
nave  been  witness  to  any  of  the  scenes  told  of  the  resur 
rection  and  the  ascension ;  and  he  declares  that  he  had 
not  believed  them. 

The  story  of  his  being  struck  to  the  ground  as  he  was 
journeying  to  Damascus,  has  nothing  in  it  miraculous  01 
extraordinary ;  he  escaped  with  life,  and  that  is  more  than 
many  others  have  done,  who  have  been  struck  with  light- 
ning ;  and  that  he  should  lose  his  sight  for  three  days,  and 
be  unable  to  eat  or  drink  during  that  time,  is  nothing  more 
than  is  common  in  such  conditions.  His  companions  that 
were  with  him  appear  not  to  have  suffered  in  the  same 
manner,  for  they  were  well  enough  to  lead  him  the  re- 
mainder of  the  journey ;  neither  did  they  pretend  to  have 
seen  any  vision. 

The  character  of  the  person  called  Paul,  according  to 
the  accounts  given  of  him,  has  in  it  a  great  deal  of  violence 
and  fanaticism ;  he  had  persecuted  with  as  much  heat  aa 
he  preached  afterwards;  the  stroke  he  had  received  had 
changed  his  thinking,  without  altering  his  constitution; 
and,  either  as  a  Jew  or  a  Christian,  he  was  the  same  zealot. 
Such  men  are  never  good  moral  evidences  of  any  doctrine 
they  preach.  They  are  always  in  extremes,  as  well  of  ac- 
tions as  of  belief. 

The  doctrine  he  sets  out  to  prove  by  argument,  is  the 
resurrection  of  the  same  body :  and  he  advances  this  as  an 
evidence  of  immortality.  But  so  much  will  men  differ  in 
their  manner  of  thinking,  and  in  the  conclusions  they  draw 
from  the  same  premises,  that  this  doctrin*  of  the 


138  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  [PART  IL 

tion  of  the  same  body,  so  far  from  being  an  evidence  of  im- 
mortality, appears  to  me  to  furnish  an  evidence  against 
it ;  for  if  I  had  already  died  in  this  body,  and  am  raised 
again  in  the  same  body  in  which  I  have  died,  it  is  pre- 
sumptive evidence  that  I  shall  die  again.  That  resurrection 
no  more  secures  me  against  the  repetition  of  dying,  than 
an  ague-fit,  when  past,  secures  me  against  another.  To 
believe,  therefore,  in  immortality,  I  must  have  a  more  ele- 
rated  idea  than  is  contained  in  the  gloomy  doctrine  of  the 
resurrection. 

Besides,  as  a  matter  of  choice,  as  well  as  of  hope,  I  had 
rather  have  a  better  body  and  a  more  convenient  form  than 
the  present.  Every  animal  in  the  creation  excels  us  in 
something.  The  winged  insects,  without  mentioning  doves 
or  eagles,  can  pass  over  more  space  with  greater  ease,  in  a 
few  minutes,  than  man  can  in  an  hour.  The  glide  of  the 
smallest  fish,  in  proportion  to  its  bulk,  exceeds  us  in  mo- 
tion, almost  beyond  comparison,  and  without  weariness. 
Even  the  sluggish  snail  can  ascend  from  the  bottom  of  a 
dungeon,  where  a  man,  by  the  want  of  that  ability,  would 
perish ;  and  a  spider  can  launch  itself  from  the  top,  as  a 
playful  amusement.  The  personal  powers  of  man  are  so 
limited,  and  his  heavy  frame  so  little  constructed  to  exten- 
sive enjoyment,  that  there  is  nothing  to  induce  us  to  wish 
the  opinion  of  Paul  to  be  true.  It  is  too  little  for  the 
magnitude  of  the  scene — too  mean  for  the  sublimity  of  the 
subject. 

But  all  other  arguments  apart,  the  consciousness  of  exist- 
ence is  the  only  conceivable  idea  we  can  have  of  another 
life,  and  the  continuance  of  that  consciousness  is  immortal- 
ity. The  consciousness  of  existence,  or  the  knowing  that 
we  exist,  is  not  necessarily  confined  to  the  same  form,  nor 
to  the  same  matter,  even  in  this  life. 

"We  have  not  in  all  cases  the  same  form,  nor  in  any  case 
the  same  matter,  that  composed  our  bodies  twenty  or  thirty 
years  ago ;  and  yet  we  are  conscious  of  beinp-  the  same 
persons.  Even  legs  and  arms,  which  make  up  almost  half 
the  human  frame,  are  not  necessary  to  the  consciousness  of 
existence.  These  may  be  lost  or  taken  away,  and  the  full 
consciousness  of  existence  remain;  and  were  their  place 
supplied  by  wings,  or  other  appendages,  wa  cannot  con- 
ceive that  it  could  alter  our  consciousness  of  existence. 
In  short,  we  know  not  how  much,  or  rather  how  little,  of 
our  comoosition  it  is,  and  how  exquisitely  fine  that  little  io. 


FAST  H.]  THE  AG  E  OF  REASON.  189 

that  creates  in  us  this  con  sciousness  of  existence ;  and  all 
beyond  that  is  like  the  pulp  of  a  peach,  distinct  and  sepa- 
rate from  the  vegetative  speck  in  the  kernel. 

Who  can  sa3r  by  what  exceeding  fine  action  of  fine  mat 
ter  it  is  that  a  thought  is  produced  in  what  we  call  the 
mind?  and  yet  that  tliought  when  produced,  as  I  now  pro- 
duce the  thought  I  am  writing,  is  capable  of  becoming  im- 
mortal, and  is  the  only  production  of  man  that  has  that 
capacity. 

Statues  of  brass  and  marble  will  perish ;  and  statues  , 
made  in  imitation  of  them  are  not  the  same  statues,  nor  the 
same  workmanship,  any  more  than  the  copy  of  a  picture  is 
the  same  picture.  But  print  and  reprint  a  thought  a  thou- 
sand times  over,  and  that  with  materials  of  any  kind — carve 
it  in  wood,  or  engrave  it  on  stone,  the  thought  is  eternally 
and  identically  the  same  thought  in  every  case.  It  has  « 
capacity  of  unimpaired  existence,  unaffected  by  change  of 
matter,  and  is  essentially  distinct,  and  of  a  nature  different 
from  every  thing  else  that  we  know  or  can  conceive.  If 
then  the  thing  produced  has  in  itself  a  capacity  of  being 
immortal,  it  is  more  than  a  token  that  the  power  that  pro- 
duced it,  which  is  the  self-same  thing  as  consciousness  of 
existence,  can  be  immortal  also ;  and  that  is  independently 
of  the  matter  it  was  first  connected  with,  as  the  thought  is 
of  the  printing  or  writing  it  first  appeared  in.  The  one 
idea  is  not  more  difficult  to  believe  than  the  other,  and  we 
can  see  that  one  is  true. 

That  the  consciousness  of  existence  is  not  dependent  on 
the  same  form  or  the  same  matter,  is  demonstrated  to  our 
senses  in  the  works  of  the  creation,  as  far  as  our  senses  are 
capable  of  receiving  that  demonstration.  A  very  numer- 
ous part  of  the  animal  creation  preaches  to  us,  far  better 
than  Paul,  the  belief  of  a  lifo  hereafter.  Their  little  life 
resembles  an  earth  and  a  hea  Ten — a  present  and  a  future 
state :  and  comprises,  if  it  may  be  so  expressed,  immortality 
in  miniature. 

The  most  beautiful  parts  o '  the  creation  to  our  eye  are 
the  winged  insects,  and  they  £  re  not  so  originally.  They 
acquire  that  form,  and  that  kirm'table  brilliancy  by  pro- 
gressive changes.  The  slow  and  creeping  caterpillar-worm 
of  to  day,  passes  in  a  few  days  to  a  torpid  figure,  and  a 
state  resembling  death;  and  in  the  next  change  cornea 
forth  in  all  the  miniature  magnificence  of  life,  a  splendid 
butterfly.  No  resemblance  of  the  former  creature  remains ; 


140  THE   AGE  OF  REASON.  [PAfcT  U 

every  thing  is  changed ;  all  his  powers  are  new,  and  life  IB 
to  him  another  thing.  We  cannot  conceive  that  the  con- 
sciousness of  existence  is  not  the  same  in  this  state  of  the 
animal  as  before ;  why  then  must  I  oelieve  that  the  resur- 
rection of  the  same  body  is  necessary  to  continue  to  me  the 
consciousness  of  existence  hereafter. 

In  the  former  part  of  the  Age  of  Reason,  I  have  called 
the  creation  the  only  true  and  real  word  of  God  ;  and  this 
instance,  of  this  text,  in  the  book  of  creation,  not  only  shows 
to  us  that  this  thing  may  be  so,  but  that  it  is  so ;  and  that 
the  belief  of  a  future  state  is  a  rational  belief,  founded  upon 
facts  visible  in  the  creation :  for  it  is  not  more  difficult  to 
believe  that  we  shall  exist  hereafter  in  a  better  state  and 
form  than  at  present,  than  that  a  worm  should  become  a 
butterfly,  and  quit  the  dunghill  for  the  atmosphere,  if  we 
did  not  know  it  as  a  fact. 

As  to  the  doubtful  jargon  ascribed  to  Paul  in  the  15th 
chapter  of  1  Corinthians,  which  makes  part  of  the  burial 
service  of  some  Christian  sectaries,  it  is  as  destitute  of 
meaning  as  the  tolling  of  the  bell  at  a  funeral ;  it  explains 
nothing  to  the  understanding — it  illustrates  nothing  to  the 
imagination,  but  leaves  the  reader  to  find  any  meaning  if 
he  can.  "  All  flesh,  (says  he,)  is  not  the  same  flesh.  There 
is  one  flesh  of  men ;  another  of  beasts ;  another  of  fishes ; 
and  another  of  birds."  And  what  then? — nothing.  A 
cook  could  have  said  as  much.  "  There  are  also,  (says  he,) 
bodies  celestial  and  bodies  terrestrial ;  the  glory  of  the 
celestial  is  one,  and  the  glory  of  the  terrestrial  is  another." 
And  what  then  ? — nothing.  And  what  is  the  difference  ? 
nothing  that  he  has  told.  "  There  is,  (says  he,)  one  glory 
of  the  sun,  and  another  glory  of  the  moon,  and  another 
glory  of  the  stars."  And  what  then? — nothing;  except 
that  he  says  that  one  star  differeth  from  another  star  in 
glory,  instead  of  distance;  and  he  might  as  well  have  told 
H8;  that  the  moon  did  not  shine  so  bright  as  the  sun.  All 
this  is  nothing  better  than  the  jargon  of  a  conjuror,  who 
picks  up  phrases  he  does  not  understand,  to  confound  the 
credulous  people  who  come  to  have  their  fortunes  told. 
Priests  and  conjurors  are  of  the  same  trade. 

Sometimes  Paul  affects  to  be  a  naturalist  and  to  prove 
his  system  of  resurrection  from  the  principles  of  vegetation. 
"  Thou  fool,  (says  he,)  that  which  thou  sowest  is  not  quick- 
ened except  it  die."  To  which  one  might  reply  in  his 
own  language,  and  say,  Thou  fool,  Paul,  that  which  thou 


PAJTT  H.j  THE    AGB   OF   REASON.  141 

Bowest  is  not  quickened  except  it  die  not ;  for  the  grain  that 
dies  in  the  ground  never  does,  nor  can  vegetate.  It  is  only 
the  living  grains  that  produce  the  next  crop.  But  the 
metaphor,  in  any  point  of  view,  is  no  simile.  It  is  succes- 
sion, and  not  resurrection. 

The  progress  of  an  animal  from  one  state  of  being  to 
another,  as  from  a  worm  to  a  butterfly,  applies  to  the  case; 
but  this  of  a  grain  does  not,  and  shows  ±*aul  to  have  been 
what  he  says  of  others,  a  fool. 

Whether  the  fourteen  epistles  ascribed  to  Paul  were 
written  by  him  or  not,  is  a  matter  of  indifference ;  they  are 
either  argumentative  or  dogmatical ;  and  as  the  argument 
is  defective,  and  the  dogmatical  part  is  merely  presumptive, 
it  signifies  not  who  wrote  them.  And  the  same  may  be 
said  for  the  remaining  parts  of  the  Testament.  It  is  not 
upon  the  epistles,  but  upon  what  is  called  the  gospel,  con- 
tained in  the  four  books  ascribed  to  Matthew,  Mark,  Luke 
and  John,  and  upon  the  pretended  prophecies,  that  the 
theory  of  the  church,  calling  itself  the  Christian  Church,  is 
founded.  The  epistles  are  dependent  upon  those,  and  must 
follow  their  fate  ;  for  if  the  story  of  Jesus  Christ  be  fabu- 
lous, all  reasoning  founded  upon  it  as  a  supposed  truth, 
must  fall  with  it. 

We  know  from  history,  that  one  of  the  principal  leaders 
of  this  church,  Athanasius,  lived  at  the  time  the  New  Testa- 
ment was  formed  ;*  and  we  know  also,  from  the  absurd 
jargon  he  has  left  us  under  the  name  of  a  creed,  the  char- 
acter of  the  men  who  formed  the  New  Testament ;  and  we 
know  also  from  the  same  history,  that  the  authenticity  of 
the  books  of  which  it  is  composed  was  denied  at  the  time. 
It  was  upon  the  vote  of  such  as  Athanasius,  that  the  Testa- 
ment was  decreed  to  be  the  word  of  God  •  and  nothing  can 
present  to  us  a  more  strange  idea  than  that  of  decreeing  the 
word  of  God  by  vote.  Those  who  rest  their  faith  upon  sufth 
authority,  put  man  in  the  place  of  God,  and  have  no  foun- 
dation for  future  happiness;  credulity,  however,  is  not  a 
crime :  b'lt  it  becomes  criminal  by  resisting  conviction.  It 
is  strangling  in  the  womb  of  the  conscience  tbo  efforts  it 
makes  to  ascertain  truth.  We  should  never  fo«v«  belief 
upon  ourselves  in  any  thing. 

I  here  close  the  subject  on  the  Old  Testament  t«*d  the 
New.  The  evidence  I  have  produced  to  prove  th»vn  for- 

died,  according  to  the  chnreh  chrocology,  in  the  yw  SV1 


142  THE  AGE  OF  EEASOW.  [PAKT  EL 

geries,  i'  extracted  from  the  books  themselves,  and  acts, 
like  a  tv/o-edged  sword,  either  way.  If  the  evidence  be 
denied,  the  authenticity  of  the  scriptures  is  denied  with  it ; 
for  it  is  scripture  evidence :  and  if  the  evidence  be  ad- 
mitted, the  authenticity  of  the  books  is  disproved.  The 
contradictory  impossibilities  contained  in  the  Old  Testa- 
ment and  the  New,  put  them  in  the  case  of  a  man  who 
swears  for  and  against.  Either  evidence  convicts  him  of 
perjury,  and  equally  destroys  reputation. 

Should  the  Bible  and  the  Testament  hereafter  fall,  it  is 
not  I  that  have  been  the  occasion.  I  have  done  no  more 
than  extracted  the  evidence  from  that  confused  mass  of 
matter  with  which  it  is  mixed,  and  arranged  that  evidence 
in  a  point  of  light  to  be  clearly  seen  and  easily  compre- 
hended ;  and,  having  done  this,  I  leave  the  reader  to  judge 
for  himself,  as  I  have  judged  for  myself. 


CONCLUSION. 

In  the  former  part  of  the  Age  of  Reason,  I  have  spoken 
of  the  three  frauds,  mystery,  miracle,  and  prophecy  /  and  as 
I  have  seen  nothing  in  any  of  the  answers  to  that  work,  that 
in  the  least  affects  what  I  have  there  said  upon  those  sub- 
jects, I  shall  not  encumber  this  Second  Part  with  additions 
that  are  not  necessary. 

I  have  -spoken  also  in  the  same  work  upon  what  is  called 
revelation,  and  have  shown  the  absurd  misapplication  of 
that  term  to  the  books  of  the  Old  Testament  and  the  New ; 
for  certainly  revelation  is  out  of  the  question  in  reciting  any 
thing  of  which  man  has  been  the  actor  or  the  witness.  That 
which  a  man  has  done  or  seen,  needs  no  revelation  to  tell 
him  he  has  done  it,  or  seen  it ;  for  he  knows  it  already ;  nor 
to  enable  him  to  tell  it,  or  to  write  it.  It  is  ignorance,  or 
imposition,  to  apply  the  term  revelation  in  such  cases ;  yet 
the  Bible  and  Testament  are  classed  under  this  fraudulent 
description  of  being  all  revelation, 

Revelation,  then,  so  far  as  the  term  has  relation  between 
God  and  man,  can  only  be  applied  to  something  which  God 
reveals  of  his  will  to  man ;  but  though  the  power  of  the 
Almighty  to  make  such  a  communication  is  necessarily  ad 
mitted,  because  to  that  power  all  things  are  possible,  yet, 
the  thing  so  revealed  (if  any  thing  er«r  was  revealed,  and 
which,  by  the  bye,  it  is  impossible  to  prove)  is  rsvelat-ic*  feo 


FAST  n.]  THE  AOB  OF  REASON.  143 

the  person  only  to  whom  it  is  made.  His  account  of  it  to 
another  is  not  revelation ;  and  whoever  puts  faith  in  that 
account,  puts  it  in  the  man  from  whom  the  account  comes ; 
and  that  man  may  have  been  deceived,  or  may  have  dreamed 
it ;  or  he  may  be  an  impostor,  and  may  lie.  There  is  no 
possible  criterion  whereby  to  judge  of  the  truth  of  what  he 
tells :  for  even  the  morality  of  it  would  be  no  proof  of  rev- 
elation. In  all  such  cases,  the  proper  answer  would  be, 
"  When  it  is  revealed  to  me,  I  will  believe  it  to  be  a  revela- 
tion /  but  it  is  not,  and  cannot  be  incumbent  upon  me  to  be- 
lieve it  to  be  a  revelation  before  ;  neither  is  it  proper  that  1 
should  take  the  word  of  a  man  as  the  word  of  God,  and  put 
man  in  the  place  of  God"  This  is  the  manner  in  which  I 
have  spoken  of  revelation  in  the  former  part  of  the  Age  of 
Reason  ;  and  which,  while  it  reverentially  admits  revelaticn 
as  a  possible  thing,  because,  as  before  said,  to  the  Almighty 
all  things  are  possible,  it  prevents  the  imposition  of  one  man 
upon  another,  and  precludes  the  wickea  use  of  pretended 
revelation. 

But  though,  speaking  for  myself,  I  thus  admit  the  possi- 
bility of  revelation,  I  totally  disbelieve  that  the  Almighty 
ever  did  communicate  any  thing  to  man,  by  any  mode  of 
speech,  in  any  language,  or  by  any  kind  of  vision,  or  ap- 
pearance, or  by  any  means  which  our  senses  are  capable  of 
receiving,  otherwise  than  by  the  universal  display  of  him- 
self in  the  works  of  creation,  and  by  that  repugnance  we 
feel  in  ourselves  to  bad  actions,  and  disposition  to  do  good 
ones. 

The  most  detestable  wickedness,  the  most  horrid  cruel- 
ties, and  the  greatest  miseries,  that  have  afflicted  the  human 
race,  have  had  their  origin  in  this  thing  called  revelation, 
or  revealed  religion.  It  has  been  the  most  dishonourable 
belief  against  the  character  of  the  Divinity,  the  most  de- 
structive to  morality,  and  the  peace  and  happiness  of  man, 
that  ever  was  propagated  since  man  began  to  exist.  It  is  bet- 
ter, far  better,  that  we  admitted,  if  it  were  possible,  a  thousand 
devils  to  roam  at  large,  and  to  preach  publicly  the  doctrine 
of  devils,  if  there  were  any  such,  than  that  we  permitted 
one  such  impostor  and  monster  as  Moses,  Joshua,  Samuel, 
and  the  Bible  prophets,  to  come  with  the  pretended  word 
of  God  in  his  month,  and  have  credit  among  us. 

Whence  arose  all  the  horrid  assassinations  of  whole  na- 
tions of  nren,  women,  and  infants,  with  which  the  Bible  ii 
filled :  and  the  bloody  persecutions,  and  tortures  onto  death, 


144  THE   AGE   OF   KEA80ST.  [PABT  IL 

and  religious  wars,  that  since  that  time  have  laid  Europe  in 
blood  and  ashes ;  whence  arose  they,  but  from  this  impioui 
thing  called  revealed  religion,  and  this  monstrous  belief, 
that  God  has  spoken  to  man  ?  The  lies  of  the  Bible  have 
been  the  cause  of  the  one,  and  the  lies  of  the  Testament  of 
the  other. 

Some  Christians  pretend,  that  Christianity  was  not  es- 
tablished by  the  sword ;  but  of  what  period  of  time  do  they 
speak  ?  It  was  impossible  that  twelve  men  could  begin  with 
the  sword ;  they  had  not  the  power ;  but  no  sooner  were  the 
professors  of  Christianity  sufficiently  powerful  to  employ 
the  sword,  than  they  did  so,  and  the  stake  and  faggot,  too ; 
and  Mahomet  could  not  do  it  sooner.  By  the  same  spirit 
that  Peter  cut  off  the  ear  of  the  high  priest's  servant 
(if  the  story  be  true)  he  would  have  cut  off  his  head,  and 
the  head  of  his  master,  had  he  been  able.  Besides  this, 
Christianity  grounds  itself  originally  upon  the  Bible,  and 
the  Bible  was  established  altogether  by  the  sword,  and  that 
in  the  worst  use  of  it ;  not  to  terrify,  but  to  extirpate.  The 
Jews  made  no  converts ;  they  butchered  all.  The  Bible  is 
the  sire  of  the  Testament,  and  both  are  called  the  word  of 
God.  The  Christians  read  both  books;  the  ministers  preach 
from  both  books ;  and  this  thing  called  Christianity  is  made 
up  of  both.  It  is  then  false  to  say  that  Christianity  was  not 
established  by  the  sword. 

The  only  sect  that  has  not  persecuted  are  the  Quakers ; 
and  the  only  reason  that  can  be  given  for  it  is,  that  they 
are  rather  Deists  than  Christians.  They  do  not  believe 
much  about  Jesus  Christ,  and  they  call  the  scriptures  a 
dead  letter.  Had  they  called  them  by  a  worse  name,  they 
had  been  nearer  the  truth. 

It  is  incumbent  on  every  man  who  reverences  the  char 
acter  of  the  Creator,  and  who  wishes  to  lessen  the  catalogue 
of  artificial  miseries,  and  remove  the  cause  that  has  sown 
persecutions  thick  among  mankind,  to  expel  all  ideas  of  re- 
vealed religion  as  a  dangerous  heresy,  and  an  impious  fraud. 
What  is  it  that  we  have  learned  from  this  pretended  thing 
called  revealed  religion?  Nothing  that  is  useful  to  man,  and 
every  thing  that  is  dishonourable  to  his  Maker.  What  is 
it  the  Bible  teaches  us? — rapine,  cruelty,  and  murder.  What 
is  it  the  Testament  teaches  us  ? — to  believe  that  the  Al- 
mighty committed  debauchery  with  a  woman,  engaged  to 
be  married?  and  the  belief  of  this  debauchery  is  called  faith, 

A*  to  tfa«>  fragments  of  morality  that  are  irregularly  and 


FAST  II. J  THE   AGK   OF   KEABON. 

thinly  scattered  m  those  books,  they  make  no  part  of  this 
pretended  thing  revealed  religion.  They  are  the  natural 
dictates  of  conscience,  and  the  bonds  by  which  society  is 
held  together,  and  without  which  it  cannot  exist ;  and  are 
nearly  the  same  in  all  religions,  and  in  all  societies.  The 
Testament  teaches  nothing  new  upon  this  subject,  and 
where  it  attempts  to  exceed,  it  becomes  mean  and  ridicu- 
lous. The  doctrine  of  not  retaliating  injuries,  is  much 
better  expressed  in  proverbs,  which  is  a  collection  as  well 
from  the  Gentiles  as  the  Jews,  than  it  is  in  the  Testament. 
It  is  there  said,  Proverbs,  xxv.  ver.  21,  "  If  thine  enemy  be 
hungry r,  give  him  bread  to  eat  j  and  if  he  be  thirsty,  give  him 
water  to  drink:"*  but  when  it  is  said,  as  in  the  Testament, 
"  If  a  man  smite  thee  on  the  right  cheek,  turn  to  him  the 
other  also  /"  it  is  assassinating  the  dignity  of  forbearance, 
and  sinking  man  into  a  spaniel. 

Loving  enemies,  is  another  dogma  of  feigned  morality, 
and  has  besides  no  meaning.  It  is  incumbent  on  man,  as 
a  moralist,  that  he  does  not  revenge  an  injury;  and  it  is 
equally  as  good  in  a  political  sense,  for  there  is  no  end  to 
retaliation,  each  retaliates  on  the  other,  and  calls  it  justice; 
out  to  love  in  proportion  to  the  injury,  if  it  could  be  done, 
would  be  to  offer  a  premium  for  crime.  Besides  the  word 
enemies  is  too  vague  and  general  to  be  used  in  a  moral 
maxim,  which  ought  always  to  be  clear  and  defined,  like  a 
Droverb.  If  a  man  be  the  enemy  of  another  from  mistake 
and  prejudice,  as  in  the  case  of  religious  opinions,  and 
sometimes  in  politics,  that  man  is  different  to  an  enemy  at 
heart  with  a  criminal  intention  ;  and  it  is  incumbent  upon  us, 
and  it  contributes  also  to  our  own  tranquillity,  that  we  put 
the  best  construction  upon  a  thing  that  it  will  bear.  But 
3ven  this  erroneous  motive  in  him,  makes  no  motive  for  love 

*  According  to  what  is  called  Christ's  sermon  on  the  mount,  in  the  book 
of  Matthew,  where,  among  some  other  good  things,  a  great  deal  of  thii 
feigned  morality  is  introduced,  it  is  there  expressly  said,  that  the  doctrin* 
of  forbearance,  or  of  not  retaliating  injuries,  was  not  any  part  of  the  doctrint 
of  the  Jew*  ,  but  as  this  doctrine  is  founded  in  proverbs;  it  must,  accordta* 
to  that  statement,  have  been  copied  from  the  Gentiles,  from  whom  Chrm 
fcad  learned  it.  Those  men,  whom  Jewish  and  Christian  idolaters  hav« 
\pusively  called  heathens,  had  much  better  and  clearer  ideas  of  justice 
•nd  morality,  than  are  to  be  found  in  the  Old  Testament,  so  far  as  it  u 
Jewish ;  or  in  the  New.  The  answer  of  Solon  on  the  question,  "  Whicn 
>»  the  most  perfect  popular  government,"  has  never  been  exceeded  by  any 
man  since  his  time,  as  containing  a  maxim  of  political  morality.  "  That," 
•ays  he,  "  where  the  least  injury  dont  to  the  meanest  individual,  is  eontidtrtd 
M  an  intuit  on  t)n  wkolt  conttitutton. '  Sokra  lir«d  about  600  y«an  b«fcM 
CM*. 

10 


1HE   AGE   OF   BEASON. 


on  the  other  part ;  and  to  say  that  we  can  love  voluntarily, 
and  without  a  motive,  is  morally  and  physically  impossible. 

Morality  is  injured  by  prescribing  to  it  duties,  that,  in 
the  first  place,  are  impossible  to  be  performed ;  and,  if  they 
could  be,  would  be  productive  of  evil ;  or,  as  before  said, 
be  premiums  for  crime.  The  maxim  of  doing  as  we  would 
be  done  unto,  does  not  include  this  strange  doctrine  of  lov- 
ing enemies ;  for  no  man  expects  to  be  loved  himself  for  his 
crime  or  for  his  enmity. 

Those  who  preach  this  doctrine  of  loving  their  enemies, 
are  in  general  the  greatest  persecutors,  and  they  act  consist- 
ently by  so  doing ;  for  the  doctrine  is  hypocritical,  and  it  is 
natural  that  hypocrisy  should  act  the  reverse  of  what  it 
preaches.  For  my  own  part,  I  disown  the  doctrine,  and 
consider  it  as  a  feigned  or  fabulous  morality ;  yet  the  man 
does  not  exist  that  can  say  I  have  persecuted  him,  or  any 
man  or  any  set  of  men,  either  in  the  American  Revolution, 
or  in  the  French  Revolution ;  or  that  I  have,  in  any  case, 
returned  evil  for  evil.  But  it  is  not  incumbent  on  man  to 
reward  a  bad  action  with  a  good  one,  or  to  return  good  for 
evil ;  and  wherever  it  is  done,  it  is  a  voluntary  act,  and  not 
a  duty.  It  is  also  absurd  to  suppose  that  such  doctrine  can 
make  any  part  of  a  revealed  religion.  We  imitate  the 
moral  character  of  the  Creator  by  forbearing  with  each 
other,  for  he  forbears  with  all ;  but  this  doctrine  would  im- 
ply that  he  loved  man,  not  in  proportion  as  he  was  good, 
out  as  he  was  bad. 

If  we  consider  the  nature  of  our  condition  here,  we  must 
see  there  is  no  occasion  for  such  a  thing  as  revealed  religion. 
What  is  it  we  want  to  know  ?  Does  not  the  creation,  the 
universe  we  behold,  preach  to  us  the  existence  of  an  Al- 
mighty power  that  governs  and  regulates  the  whole  ?  And 
is  not  the  evidence  that  this  creation  holds  out  to  our  senses 
infinitely  stronger  than  any  thing  we  can  read  in  a  book, 
that  any  impostor  might  make  and  call  the  word  of  God  I 
As  for  morality,  the  knowledge  of  it  exists  in  every  man's 
conscience. 

Here  we  are.  The  existence  of  an  Almighty  power  is 
sufficiently  demonstrated  to  us,  though  we  cannot  conceive, 
as  it  is  impossible  we  should,  the  nature  and  manner  of  its 
existence.  We  cannot  conceive  how  we  came  here  our- 
selves, and  yet  we  know  for  a  fact  that  we  are  here.  We 
must  know  also,  that  the  power  that  called  us  into  being, 
OKI,  if  he  please,  and  when  he  pleases,  call  us  to  account 


PAST  II.]  THE  AGE  OF  REASON.  147 

for  the  manner  in  which  we  have  lived  here  ;  and,  therefore, 
without  seeking  any  other  motive  for  the  belief,  it  is  ra- 
tional to  believe  that  he  will,  for  we  know  beforehand  that 
he  can.  The  probability  or  even  possibility  of  the  thing  ii 
all  that  we  ought  to  know ;  for  if  we  knew  it  as  a  fact,  we 
should  be  the  mere  slaves  of  terror ;  or  belief  would  have 
no  merit,  and  our  best  actions  no  virtue. 

Deism  then  teaches  us,  without  the  possibility  of  being 
deceived,  all  that  is  necessary  or  proper  to  be  known.  The 
creation  is  the  Bible  of  the  Deist.  He  there  reads,  in  the 
handwriting  of  the  Creator  himself,  the  certainty  of  his 
existence,  and  the  immutability  of  his  power,  and  all  other 
Bibles  and  Testaments  are  to  him  forgeries.  The  proba- 
bility that  we  may  be  called  to  account  hereafter,  will,  to 
a  reflecting  mind,  have  the  influence  of  belief;  for  it  is  not 
our  belief  or  disbelief  that  can  make  or  unmake  the  fact. 
As  this  is  the  state  we  are  in,  and  which  it  is  proper  we 
should  be  in,  as  free  agents,  it  is  the  fool  only,  and  not  the 
philosopher,  or  even  the  prudent  man,  that  would  live  as 
if  there  were  no  God. 

But  the  belief  of  a  God  is  so  weakened  by  being  mixed 
with  the  strange  fable  of  the  Christian  creed,  and  with  the 
wild  adventures  related  in  the  Bible,  and  of  the  obscurity 
and  obscene  nonsense  of  the  Testament,  that  the  mind  of 
man  is  bewildered  as  in  a  fog.  Yiewing  all  these  things 
in  a  confused  mass,  he  confounds  fact  with  fable ;  and  as 
he  cannot  believe  all,  he  feels  a  disposition  to  reject  all. 
But  the  belief  of  a  God  is  a  belief  distinct  from  all  other 
things,  and  ought  not  to  be  confounded  with  any.  The 
notion  of  a  Trinity  of  Gods  has  enfeebled  the  belief  of 
one  God.  A  multiplication  of  beliefs  acts  as  a  division  of 
belief;  and  in  proportion  as  any  thing  is  divided  it  is 
weakened. 

Religion,  by  such  means,  becomes  a  thing  of  form,  in- 
stead ot  fact ;  of  notion,  instead  of  principles ;  morality  is 
banished,  to  make  room  for  an  imaginary  thing,  called 
faith,  and  this  faith  has  its  origin  in  a  supposed  debauchery; 
a  man  is  preached  instead  of  God ;  an  execution  is  an  ob- 
ject for  gratitude ;  the  preachers  daub  themselves  with  the 
blood,  like  a  troop  ~>f  assassins,  and  pretend  to  admire  the 
brilliancy  it  gives  them ;  they  preach  a  humdrum  sermon 
on  the  merits  of  the  execution ;  then  praise  Jesus  Christ 
for  being  executed,  and  condemn  the  Jews  for  doing  it. 

A  man,  by  hearing  all  this  nonsense  lumped  and  preached 


148  THE    AGE   OF   REASON.  [PABT  O. 

together,  confounds  the  God  of  the  creation  with  the  im- 
agined God  of  the  Christians,  and  lives  as  if  there  were 
none. 

Of  all  the  systems  of  religion  that  ever  were  invented, 
there  is  none  more  derogatory  to  the  Almighty,  more  un- 
edifying  to  man,  more  repugnant  to  reason,  and  more  con- 
tradictory in  itself,  than  this  thing  called  Christianity.  Too 
absurd  for  belief,  too  impossible  to  convince,  and  too  incon- 
sistent for  practice,  it  renders  the  heart  torpid,  or  produces 
only  atheists  and  fanatics.  As  an  engine  of  power,  it 
serves  the  purpose  of  despotism  ;  and  as  a  means  of  wealth, 
the  avarice  of  priests ;  but  so  far  as  respects  the  good  of 
man  in  general,  it  leads  to  nothing  here  or  hereafter. 

The  only  religion  that  has  not  been  invented,  and  that 
has  in  it  every  evidence  of  divine  originality,  is  pure  and 
simple  Deism.  It  must  have  been  the  first,  and  will  prob- 
ably be  the  last  that  man  believes.  But  pure  and  simple 
Deism  does  not  answer  the  purpose  of  despotic  govern- 
ments. They  cannot  lay  hold  of  religion  as  an  engine,  but 
by  mixing  it  with  human  inventions,  and  making  their  own 
authority  a  part ;  neither  does  it  answer  the  avarice  of 
priests  but  by  incorporating  themselves  and  their  functions 
with  it,  and  becoming,  like  the  government,  a  party  in  the 
system.  It  is  this  that  forms  the  otherwise  mysterious  con- 
nection of  church  and  state ;  the  church  humane,  and  the 
state  tyrannic. 

Were  man  impressed  as  fully  and  as  strongly  as  he 
ought  to  be  with  the  belief  of  a  God,  his  moral  life  would 
be  regulated  by  the  force  of  that  belief ;  he  would  stand  in 
awe  of  God,  and  of  himself,  and  would  not  do  the  thing 
that  could  not  be  concealed  from  either.  To  give  this  be- 
lief the  full  opportunity  of  force,  it  is  necessary  that  it  acts 
alone.  This  is  Deism. 

But  when,  according  to  the  Christian  Trinitarian  scheme, 
one  part  of  God  is  represented  ty  a  dying  man,  and  an- 
other part  called  the  Holy  Ghost,  by  a  nying  pigeon,  if 
is  impossible  that  belief  can  attach  itself  to  such  wild 
conceits.* 

*  The  book  called  the  book  of  Matthew,  says,  chap.  Hi.  vef.  16,  that  the 
Holy  Ghost  descended  in  the  shape  of  a  dove.  It  might  &»  well  have  said  a 
goose;  the  creatures  are  equally  harmless,  and  the  one  is  as  much  a  non- 
sensical lie  as  the  other.  The  second  of  Acts,  ver.  2,  3,  says,  that  it  de- 
scended in  a  mighty  rushing  wind,  in  the  shape  of  cloven  tongues :  perhaps  it 
was  eleven  'eet  Such  absurd  stuff  is  only  fit  for  tales  of  witchet  and 
wizards. 


T ABT  II.]  THE   AGE   OF   REASON.  149 

It  has  been  the  scheme  of  the  Christian  church,  and  of 
all  the  other  invented  systerrs  of  religion,  to  hold  man  in 
ignorance  of  the  Creator,  as  it  is  of  government  to  hold  man 
in  ignorance  of  b;«  rights.  The  systems  of  the  one  are  aa 
false  as  those  of  tue  other,  and  are  calculated  for  mutual 
support.  The  study  of  theology,  as  it  stands  in  Christian 
churches,  is  the  stucty  of  nothing;  it  is  founded  on  nothing; 
it  rests  on  no  principles ;  it  proceeds  by  no  authorities ;  it 
has  no  data ;  it  can  demonstrate  nothing ;  and  it  admits  of 
no  conclusion.  Not  any  thing  can  be  studied  as  a  science, 
without  our  being  in  possession  of  the  principles  upon  which 
it  is  founded ;  and  as  this  is  not  the  case  with  Christian 
theology,  it  is  therefore  the  study  of  nothing. 

Instead  then  of  studying  theology,  as  is  now  done,  out 
of  the  Bible  and  Testament,  the  meanings  of  which  books 
are  always  controverted,  and  the  authenticity  of  which  is 
disproved,  it  is  necessary  that  we  refer  to  the  Bible  of  the 
creation.  The  principles  we  discover  there  are  eternal,  and 
of  divine  origin  :  they  are  the  foundation  of  all  the  science 
that  exists  in  the  world,  and  must  be  the  foundation  of 
theology. 

We  can  know  God  only  through  his  works.  We  cannot 
have  a  conception  of  any  one  attribute,  but  by  following 
Borne  principle  that  leads  to  it.  We  have  only  a  confused 
idea  of  his  power,  if  we  have  not  the  means  of  comprehend- 
ing something  of  its  immensity.  We  can  have  no  idea  of 
his  wisdom,  but  by  knowing  the  order  and  manner  in  which 
it  acts.  The  principles  of  science  lead  to  this  knowledge ; 
for  the  Creator  of  man  is  the  Creator  of  science  ;  and  it  is 
through  that  medium  that  man  can  see  God,  as  it  were, 
face  to  face. 

Could  a  man  be  placed  in  a  situation,  and  endowed  with 
the  power  of  vision,  to  behold  at  one  view,  and  to  contem- 
plate deliberately,  the  structure  of  the  universe ;  to  mark 
the  movements  of  the  several  planets,  the  cause  of  their 
varying  appearances,  the  unerring  order  in  which  they  re- 
volve, even  to  the  remotest  comet ;  their  connection  and 
dependence  on  each  other,  and  to  know  the  system  of  lawg 
established  by  the  Creator,  that  governs  and  regulates  the 
whole ;  he  would  then  conceive,  far  beyond  what  any 
church  theology  can  teach  him,  the  power,  the  wisdom,  the 
vastness,  the  munificence  of  the  Creator ;  he  would  then 
«ee,  that  all  the  knowledge  man  has  of  science,  and  that  all 
the  mechanical  arts  by  which  he  renders  his  situation  com- 


150  THE  AGE  OF  REASON.  [PART  H. 

fortable  here,  are  derived  from  that  source:  his  mind,  ex- 
alted by  the  scene,  and  convinced  by  the  fact,  would 
increase  in  gratitude  as  it  increased  in  knowledge ;  his 
religion  or  his  worship  would  become  united  with  his  im- 

Erovement  as  a  man ;  any  employment  he  followed,  that 
ad  connection  with  the  principles  of  the  creacion,  as  every 
thing  of  agriculture,  of  science,  and  of  the  mechanical  arts, 
has,  would  teach  him  more  of  God,  and  of  che  gratitude  he 
owes  to  him,  than  any  theological  Christian  sermon  he  now 
hears.  Great  objects  inspire  great  thoughts;  great  muni- 
ficence excites  great  gratitude ;  but  the  grovelling  tales  and 
doctrines  of  the  Bible  and  the  Testament  are  fit  only  to  ex 
cite  contempt. 

Though  man  cannot  arrive,  at  least  in  this  life,  at  the 
actual  scene  I  have  described,  he  can  demonstrate  it ;  be 
cause  he  has  a  knowledge  of  the  principles  upon  which  the 
creation  is  constructed.  We  know  that  the  greatest  works 
can  be  represented  in  model,  and  that  the  universe  can  be 
represented  by  the  same  means.  The  same  principles  by 
which  we  measure  an  inch,  or  an  acre  of  ground,  will  meas- 
ure to  millions  in  extent.  A  circle  of  an  inch  diameter  has 
the  same  geometrical  properties  as  a  circle  that  would  cir- 
cumscribe the  universe.  The  same  properties  of  a  triangle 
that  will  demonstrate  upon  paper  me  course  of  a  ship,  will 
do  it  on  the  ocean ;  and  when  applied  to  what  are  called 
the  heavenly  bodies,  will  ascertain  to  a  minute  the  time  of 
an  eclipse,  though  these  bodies  are  millions  of  miles  distant 
from  us.  This  knowledge  is  of  divine  origin ;  and  it  is  from, 
the  Bible  of  the  creation  that  man  has  learned  it,  and  not 
from  the  stupid  Bible  of  the  church,  that  teacheth  man 
nothing.* 

*  The  Bible-makers  have  undertaken  to  give  us,  in  the  first  chapter  of 
Genesis,  an  account  of  the  creation ;  and  in  doing  this  they  have  demon- 
atrated  nothing  but  their  ignorance.  They  make  there  to  have  been  three 
days  and  three  nights,  evenings  and  mornings,  before  there  was  a  eun ;  when 
it  is  the  presence  cr  absence  of  a  sun  that  is  the  cause  of  day  and  night — and 
what  is  called  his  rising  and  setting,  that  of  morning  and  evening.  Besides, 
it  is  a  puerile  and  pitiful  idea,  to  suppose  the  Almighty  to  say,  "Let  there 
be  light."  It  is  the  imperative  manner  of  speaking  that  a  conjuror  uses, 
when  he  says  to  his  cups  and  balls,  Presto,  be  gone — and  most  probably  has 
been  taken  from  it,  as  Moses  and  his  rod  are  a  conjuror  and  his  wand. 
Longinus  calls  this  expression  the  sublime ;  and  by  the  same  rule  the  conju- 
ror is  sublime  tco ;  for  the  manner  of  speaking  is  expressively  and  grammat- 
ically the  same.  When  authors  and  critics  talk  of  the  sublime,  they  see  not 
how  nearly  it  borders  on  the  ridiculous.  The  sublime  o*  the  critics,  like 
•ome  parts  of  Edmund  Burke's  sublime  and  beautiful,  is  like  a  wind-mill  just 
visible  in  a  fog,  which  imagination  might  distort  into  a  flying  mountain,  at 
M  archangel,  or  a  flock  of  wild  ge 


PAST  H.]  THE  AGE  OF  REASON.  151 

All  the  knowledge  man  has  of  science  and  of  machinery, 
by  the  aid  of  which  his  existence  is  rendered  comfortable 
upon  earth,  and  without  which  he  would  be  scarcely  dis- 
tinguishable in  appearance  and  condition  from  a  common 
animal,  comes  from  the  great  machine  and  structure  of  the 
universe.  The  constant  and  unwearied  observations  of  our 
ancestors  upon  the  movements  and  revolutions  of  the  heav- 
enly bodies,  in  what  are  supposed  to  have  been  the  early 
ages  of  the  world,  have  brought  this  knowledge  upon  earth. 
It  is  not  Moses  and  the  prophets,  nor  Jesus  Christ,  nor  his 
apostles  that  have  done  it.  The  Almighty  is  the  great 
mechanic  of  the  creation ;  the  first  philosopher  and  original 
teacher  of  all  science  ; — Let  us  then  learn  to  reverence  our 
master,  and  let  us  not  forget  the  labours  of  our  ancestors. 

Had  we,  at  this  day,  no  knowledge  of  machinery,  and 
were  it  possible  that  man  could  have  a  view,  as  I  have 
before  described,  of  the  structure  and  machinery  of  the 
universe,  he  would  soon  conceive  the  idea  of  constructing 
some  at  least  of  the  mechanical  works  we  now  have  :  ana 
the  idea  so  conceived  would  progressively  advance  in  prac- 
tice. Or  could  a  model  of  the  universe,  such  as  is  called 
an  orrery,  be  presented  before  him  and  put  in  motion,  his 
mind  would  arrive  at  the  same  idea.  Such  an  object  and 
such  a  subject  would,  whilst  it  improved  him  in  knowledge 
useful  to  himself  as  a  man  and  a  member  of  society,  as  well 
as  entertaining,  afford  far  better  matter  for  impressing  him 
with  a  knowledge  of,  and  a  belief  in  the  Creator,  and  of  the 
reverence  and  gratitude  that  man  owes  to  him,  than  the 
stupid  texts  of  the  Bible  and  of  the  Testament,  from  which, 
be  the  talents  of  the  preacher  what  they  may,  only  sttpid 
sermons  can  be  preached.  If  man  must  preach,  let  him 
preach  something  that  is  edifying,  and  from  texts  that  are 
known  to  be  true. 

The  Bible  of  the  creation  ia  inexhaustible  in  texts. 
Every  part  of  science,  whether  connected  with  the  geome- 
try of  the  universe,  with  the  systems  of  animal  and  vegeta- 
ble life,  or  with  the  properties  of  inanimate  matter,  is  a  text 
as  well  for  devotion  as  tor  philosophy — for  gratitude  as  for 
human  improvement.  It  will  perhaps  be  said,  that  if  such 
a  revolution  in  the  system  of  religion  takes  place,  every 
preacher  ought  to  be  a  philosopher. — Most  certainly ;  and 
every  house  of  devotion  a  school  of  science. 

It  has  been  by  wandering  from  the  immutable  laws  of 
and  the  right  use  ot  reason,  and  setting  up  an  in- 


152  THE   AGE   OF  SEASON.  [PAST  U 

vented  thing  called  revealed  religion,  that  so  many  wild 
and  blasphemous  conceits  have  been  formed  of  the  Al- 
mighty. The  Jews  have  made  him  the  assassin  of  the 
human  species,  to  make  room  for  the  religion  of  the  Jews. 
The  Christians  have  made  him  the  murderer  of  himself, 
and  the  founder  of  a  .new  religion,  to  supersede  and  expel 
the  Jewish  religion.  And  to  find  pretence  and  admission 
for  these  things,  they  must  have  supposed  his  power  and 
his  wisdom  imperfect,  or  his  will  changeable;  and  the 
changeableness  of  the  will  is  the  imperfection  of  the  judg- 
ment. The  philosopher  knows  that  the  laws  of  the  Creator 
have  never  changed  with  respect  either  to  the  principles 
of  science,  or  the  properties  of  matter.  Why,  then,  is  it 
supposed  they  have  changed  with  respect  to  man  ? 

I  here  close  the  subject.  I  have  shown  in  all  the  fore- 
going parts  of  this  work  that  the  Bible  and  Testament  are 
impositions  and  forgeries ;  and  I  leave  the  evidence  I  have 
produced  in  proof  of  it  to  be  refuted,  if  any  one  can  do  it ; 
and  I  leave  the  ideas  that  are  suggested  in  the  conclusion 
of  the  work  to  rest  01?  the  mind  ot  the  reader ;  certain  as  I 
am,  that  when  opinion  are  free,  either  in  matters  of  gov- 
ernment or  religior  truth  wi)1  finally  and  powerfully 
prevail. 


PASSAGES  IN  THE  NEW  TESTAMENT 

QUOTED  FROM  THE  OLD, 


PROPHECIES  CONCERNING  JESUS  CHRIST. 


TOOKTHKB   WITH 


RKPtiY  TO  TUJU  BISHIOP  OB1 
A  LETTER  TO  MR.  ERSKINE, 


PREFACE. 


TO  THE  MINISTERS  AND  PREACHERS  OF  ALL  DENOMINA. 

TIONS  OF  RELIGION. 

IT  is  the  duty  of  every  man,  as  far  as  his  ability  extends, 
to  detect  and  expose  delusion  and  error.  But  nature  has  not 
given  to  every  one  a  talent  for  the  purpose ;  and  among 
those  to  whom  such  a  talent  is  given,  there  is  often  a  want 
of  disposition  or  of  courage  to  do  it. 

The  world,  or  more  properly  speaking,  that  small  part  of 
it  called  Christendom,  or  the  Christian  World,  has  been 
amused  for  more  than  a  thousand  years  with  accounts  of 
Prophecies  in  the  Old  Testament,  about  the  coming  of  the 
person  called  Jesus  Christ,  and  thousands  of  sermons 
have  been  preached,  and  volumes  written,  to  make  man 
believe  it. 

In  the  following  treatise  I  have  examined  all  the  passages 
in  the  New  Testament,  quoted  from  the  Old,  and  called 
prophecies  concerning  Jesus  Christ,  and  I  find  no  such  thing- 
as  a  prophecy  of  any  such  person,  and  I  deny  there  are  any. 
The  passages  all  relate  to  circumstances  the  Jewish  nation 
was  in  at  the  time  they  were  written  or  spoken,  and  not  tc 
any  thing  that  was  or  was  not  to  happen  in  the  world  several 
hundred  years  afterwards ;  and  I  have  shown  what  the  circum- 
stances were,  to  which  the  passage*  apply  or  refer.  I  have 

given  chapter  and  verse  for  every  thing  I  have  said,  and 

m 


156  PREFACE. 

have  not  gone  out  of  the  books  of  the  Old  and  New  Testa- 
ment for  evidence  that  the  passages  are  not  prophecies  of  the 
person  called  Jesus  Christ. 

The  prejudice  of  unfounded  belief,  often  degenerates  into 
the  prejudice  of  custom,  and  becomes,  at  last,  rank  hypocrisy. 
When  men,  from  custom  or  fashion,  or  any  worldly  motive, 
profess  or  pretend  to  believe  what  they  do  not  believe,  nor 
can  give  any  reason  for  believing,  they  unship  the  helm  of 
their  morality,  and  being  no  longer  honest  to  their  own  minds, 
they  feel  no  moral  difficulty  in  being  unjust  to  others.  It  is 
from  the  influence  of  this  vice,  hypocrisy,  that  we  see  so 
many  Church  and  Meeting-going  professors  and  pretenders 
to  religion,  so  full  of  trick  and  deceit  in  their  dealings,  and 
so  loose  in  the  performance  of  their  engagements,  that  they 
are  not  to  be  trusted  further  than  the  laws  of  the  country  will 
bind  them.  Morality  has  no  hold  on  their  minds,  no  restraint 
on  their  actions. 

One  set  of  preachers  make  salvation  to.consist  in  believ- 
ing. They  tell  their  congregations,  that  if  they  believe  in 
Christ,  their  sins  shall  be  forgiven.  This,  in. the  first  place, 
is  an  encouragement  to  sin,  in  a  similar  manner  as  when  a 
prodigal  young  fellow  is  told  his  father  will  pay  all  his  debts, 
he  runs  into  debt  the  faster,  and  becomes  more  extravagant : 
Daddy,  says  he,  pays  all,  and  on  he  goes.  Just  so  in  the 
other  case,  Christ  pays  all,  and  on  goes  the  sinner. 

In  the  next  place,  the  doctrine  these  men  preach  is  not 
true.  The  New  Testament  rests  itself  for  credulity  and  testi- 
mony on  what  are  called  prophecies  in  the  Old  Testament, 
of  the  person  called  Jesus  Christ ;  and  if  there  are  no  such 
things  as  prophecies  of  any  such  person  in  the  Old  Testament,, 
the  New  Testament  is  a  forgery  of  the  councils  of  Nice  and 
Laodicea,  and  the  faith  founded  thereon,  delusion  and  false- 
hood.* 

*  The  councils  of  Nice  and  Laodicea  were  held  about  350  years  after  the 
time  of  Christ  is  said  to  have  lived ;  and  the  books  that  now  compose  the  New 
Testament,  were  then  voted  for  by  YEAS  and  NATS,  as  we  now  vote  a  law.  A 
great  many  that  were  offered  had  a  majority  of  nays,  and  were  rejected.  Tkis 
is  the  way  the  New  Testament  came  into  being. 


PREFACE.  167 

Another  set  of  preachers  tell  their  congregations  that  God 
predestinated  and  selected  from  all  eternity,  a  certain  number 
to  be  saved,  and  a  certain  number  to  be  damned  eternally. 
If  this  were  true,  the  day  of  Judgment  is  PAST  :  thevr  preach- 
ing is  in  vain,  and  they  had  better  work  at  some  useful 
calling  for  their  livelihood. 

This  doctrine,  also,  like  the  former,  hath  a  direct  tendency 
to  demoralize  mankind.  Can  a  bad  man  be  reformed  by 
telling  him,  that  if  he  is  one  of  those  who  was  decreed  to  be 
damned  before  he  was  born,  his  reformation  will  do  him  no 
good ;  and  if  he  was  decreed  to  be  saved,  he  will  be  saved 
whether  he  believes  it  or  not ;  for  this  is  the  result  of  the 
doctrine.  Such  preaching,  and  such  preachers,  do  injury  to 
the  moral  world.  They  had  better  be  at  the  plough. 

As  in  my  political  works  my  motive  and  object  have  been 
to  give  man  an  elevated  sense  of  his  own  character,  and  free 
him  from  the  slavish  and  superstitious  absurdity  of  monarchy 
and  hereditary  government,  so  in  my  publications  on  reli- 
gious subjects  my  endeavors  have  been  directed  to  bring 
man  to  a  right  use  of  the  reason  that  God  has  given  him ; 
to  impress  on  him  the  great  principles  of  divine  morality, 
justice,  mercy,  and  a  benevolent  disposition  to  all  men,  and 
to  all  creatures,  and  to  inspire  in  him  a  spirit  of  trust,  confi- 
dence and  •  consolation  in  hia  Creator,  unshackled  by  the 
fables  of  books  pretending  to  be  the  word  of  God. 

THOMAS  PAINE. 


AS 

EXAMINATION 

or  THK 

PASSAGES  IN  THE  NEW  TESTAMENT, 

QUOTED   FBOil  THK  OLD,   AND  (ULLXD   PROPHKOIKS  Of  TEX  COMING  OF 

JESUS  CHRIST. 


[Tms  work  was  first  published  by  Mr.  Paine,  at  New- 
York,  in  1807,  and  was  the  last  of  his  writings,  edited  by 
himself.  It  is  evidently  extracted  from  his  answer  to  the 
bishop  of  Llandaff,  or  rrom  his  third  part  of  the  Age  of 
Reason,  both  of  which,  it  appears  by  his  will,  he  left  in 
manuscript.  The  term,  "  The  J^ishop,  occurs  in  this  exami- 
nation six  times  without  designating  what  bishop  is  meant. 
Of  all  the  replies  to  his  second  part  of  the  Age  of  Reason, 
that  of  bishop  "Watson  was  the  only  one  to  which  he  paid 
particular  attention ;  and  he  is,  no  doubt,  the  person  here 
alluded  to.  Bishop  Watson's  apology  for  the  Bible  had  been 
published  some  years  before  Mr.  P.  left  France,  and  the  latter 
composed  his  answer  to  it,  and  also  his  third  part  of  the  Age 
of  Reason,  while  in  that  country. 

When  Mr.  Paine  arrived  in  America,  and  found  that 
liberal  opinions  on  religion  were  in  disrepute,  through  the 
influence  of  hypocrisy  and  superstition,  he  declined  publish- 
ing the  entire  of  the  works  which  he  had  prepared ;  observ- 
ing that  "  An  author  might  lose  the  credit  he  had  acquired 
by  writing  too  much."  He  however  gave  to  the  public  the 
examination  before  us,  in  a  pamphlet  form.  But  trie  apathy 
which  appeared  to  prevail  at  that  time  in  regard  to  religious 
Enquiry,  rally  determined  him  to  discontinue  the  publication 

169 


160  EXAMINATION    OF 

of  his  theological  writings.  In  this  case,  taking  only  a  por- 
tion of  one  of  the  works  before  mentioned,  he  chose  a  title 
adapted  to  the  particular  part  selected.] 

The  passages  called  Prophecies  of,  or  concerning,  Jesus 
Christ,  in  the  Old  Testament,  may  be  classed  under  the  two 
following  heads : — 

First  those  referred  to  in  the  four  books  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment, called  the  four  Evangelists,  Matthew,  Mark,  Luke,  and 
John. 

Secondly,  those  which  translators  and  commentators  have, 
of  their  own  imagination,  erected  into  prophecies,  and  dubbed 
with  that  title  at  the  head  of  the  several  chapters  of  the 
Old  Testament.  Of  these  it  is  scarcely  worth  while  to  waste 
time,  ink  and  paper  upon ;  I  shall,  therefore,  confine  my- 
self chiefly  to  those  referred  to  in  the  aforesaid  four  books 
of  the  New  Testament.  If  I  show  that  these  are  not  prophe- 
cies of  the  person  called  Jesus  Christ,  nor  have  reference  to 
any  such  person,  it  will  be  perfectly  needless  to  combat  those 
which  translators,  or  the  Church,  have  invented,  and  for 
which  they  had  no  other  authority  than  their  own  imagi- 
nation. 

I  begin  with  the  book  called  the  Gospel  according  to  St. 
Matthew. 

In  the  first  chap.  ver.  18,  it  is  said,  "  Now  the  birth  of  Jesus 
Christ  was  in  this  wise  /  when  his  Mother  Mary  was  espoused 
to  Joseph,  before  they  came  together  SHE  WAS  FOUND  WITH 
CHTLD  BY  THE  HOLY  GHOST." — This  is  going  a  little  too  fast ; 
because  to  make  this  verse  agree  with  tne  next  it  should  have 
said  no  more  than  that  she  was  found  with  child  ;  for  the 
next  verse  says,  "  Then  Joseph  her  husband  being  a  just 
man,  and  not  willing  to  make  her  a  public  example,  was 
minded  to  put  her  away  privily" — Consequently  Joseph 
had  found  out  no  more  than  that  she  was  with  child,  and  he 
knew  it  was  not  by  himself. 

Y.  20.  "  And  while  he  thought  of  these  things,  (that  is, 
whether  he  should  put  her  away  privily,  or  make  a  public 
example  of  her)  behold  the  Angel  of  the  L,ord  appeared  to  him 
IN  A  DBEAM  (that  is,  Joseph  dreamed  that  an  angel  appeared 
unto  him)  saying,  Joseph,  thou  son  of  David,  fear  not  to  take 
unto  thee  Mary  thy  wife,  for  that  which  is  conceived  in  her  is 
of  the  Holy  Ghost.  Ana  she  shall  bring  forth  a  son  andcaU 
his  name  Jesus;  for  he  shall  save  hi$  people  from  their  sins" 

Now,  without  entering  intc  any  discussion  upon  the 
merits  or  demeiats  of  the  account  here  given,  it  is  proper  to 


THE   PROPHECIES.  161 

observe,  that  it  has  no  higher  authority  than  that  of  a 
dream ;  for  it  is  impossible  for  a  man  to  behold  any  tiling 
in  a  dream,  but  that  which  he  dreams  of.  I  ask  not,  there- 
fore, whether  Joseph  (if  there  was  such  a  man)  had  such  a 
dream  or  not ;  because  admitting  he  had,  it  proves  nothing. 
So  wonderful  and  rational  is  the  faculty  of  the  mind  in 
dreams,  that  it  acts  the  part  of  all  the  characters  its  imagi- 
nation creates,  and  what  it  thinks  it  hears  from  any  of 
them,  is  no  other  than  what  the  roving  rapidity  of  its  own 
imagination  invents.  It  is,  therefore,  notning  to  me  what 
Joseph  dreamed  of;  whether  of  the  fidelity  or  infidelity  of 
his  wife. — I  pay  no  regard  to  my  own  dreams,  and  I  should 
be  weak  indeed  to  put  faith  in  the  dreams  of  another. 

The  verses  that  follow  those  I  have  quoted,  are  the  words 
of  the  writer  of  the  book  of  Matthew.  "  Now,  (says  he,) 
all  this  (that  is,  all  this  dreaming  and  this  pregnancy)  was 
done  that  it  might  be  fulfilled  which  was  spoken  of  the  Lord 
by  the  Prophet,  saying, 

"  Behold  a  virgin  shall  be  with  child,  and  shall  bring 
forth  a  son,  and  they  shall  call  his  name  Emanuel,  which 
beina  interpreted,  is,  God  with  u#" 

This  passage  is  in  Isaiah,  chap.  vii.  ver.  14,  and  the  writer 
of  the  book  ofMatthew  endeavours  to  make  his  readers  believe 
that  this  passage  is  a  prophecy  of  the  person  called  Jesus 
Christ.  It  is  no  such  thing — and  I  go  to  show  it  is  not. 
But  it  is  first  necessary  that  I  explain  the  occasion  of  these 
words  being  spoken  by  Isaiah ;  the  reader  will  then  easily 
perceive,  that  so  far  from  their  being  a  prophecy  of  Jesus 
Christ,  they  have  not  the  least  reference  to  such  a  person,  or 
any  thing  that  could  happen  in  the  time  that  Chnst  is  said 
to  have  lived — which  was  about  seven  hundred  years  after 
the  time  of  Isaiah.  The  case  is  this : 

On  the  death  of  Solomon  the  Jewish  nation  split  into  two 
monarchies :  one  called  the  kingdom  of  Judah,  the  capital 
of  which  was  Jerusalem :  the  other  the  kingdom  of  Israel, 
the  capital  of  which  was  Samaria.  'The  kingdom  of  Judah 
followed  the  line  of  David,  and  the  kingdom  of  Israel  that 
of  Saul ;  and  these  two  rival  monarchies  frequently  carried 
on  fierce  wars  against  each  other. 

At  the  time  Ahaz  was  king  of  Judah,  which  was  in  the 
time  of  Isaiah,  Pekah  was  king  of  Israel ;  and  Pekah  joined 
hi  mself  to  Rezin,  king  of  Syria,  to  make  war  against  Ahaz, 
king  of  Judah  ;  and  these  two  kings  marched  a  confederat- 
ed and  powerful  army  against  Jerusalem.  «  Ahaz  and  his 


102  EXAMINATION    OF 

people  became  alarmed  at  the  danger,  and  "  their  hea/rts  t 
moved  as  the  trees  of  the  wood  are  moved  with  the  wind" 
Isaiah,  chap.  vii.  ver.  3. 

In  this  perilous  situation  of  things,  Isaiah  addressed  him 
self  to  Ahaz.  and  assures  him,  in  the  name  of  the  Lord,  (the 
cant  phrase  of  all  the  prophets)  that  these  two  kings  should 
not  succeed  against  him ;  ahd,  to  assure  him  that  this  should 
be  the  case,  (the  case  was  however  directly  contrary*)  tells 
Ahaz  to  ask  a  sign  of  the  Lord.  This  Ahaz  declined  doing, 
giving  as  a  reason,  that  he  would  not  tempt  the  Lord ;  upon 
which  Isaiah,  who  pretends  to  be  sent  from  God,  says,  ver. 
14,  "  Therefore  the  Lord  himself  shall  give  you  a  sign,  be- 
hold a  virgin  shall  conceive  and  bear  a  son — Butter  and 
honey  shall  he  eat,  that  he  may  know  to  refuse  the  evil  and 
choose  the  good — For  before  the  child  shall  know  to  refuse 
the  evil  and  choose  the  good,  the  land  which  thou  abhorrest 
shall  be  forsaken  of  both  her  kings" — meaning  the  king 
of  Israel  and  the  king  of  Syria,  who  were  marching  against 
him. 

Here  then  is  the  sign,  which  was  to  be  the  birth  of  a  child, 
and  that  child  a  son ;  and  here  also  is  the  time  limited  for 
the  accomplishment  of  the  sign,  namely,  before  the  child 
should  know  to  refuse  the  evil  and  choose  the  good. 

The  thing,  therefore,  to  be  a  sign  of  success  to  Ahaz,  must 
be  something  that  would  take  place  before  the  event  of  the 
battle  then  pending  between  him  and  the  two  kings  could  be 
known.  A  thing  to  be  a  sign  must  precede  the  thing  signi- 
fied. The  sign  of  rain  must  be  before  the  rain. 

It  would  have  been  mockery  and  insulting  nonsense  for 
Isaiah  to  have  assured  Ahaz  as  a  sign,  that  these  two  kings 
should  not  prevail  against  him  :  that  a  child  should  be  born 
seven  hundred  years  after  he  was  dead ;  and  that  before  the 
child  so  born  should  know  to  refuse  the  evil  and  choose  the 
good,  he,  Ahaz,  should  be  delivered  from  the  danger  he  was 
then  immediately  threatened  with 

*  Chron.  chap,  xiviii.  ver.  lat.  Ahaz  was  twenty  years  old  when  he  began  to 
reign,  and  he  reigned  sixteen  years  in  Jerusalem,  but  he  did  not  that  which  was 
right  in  the  sight  of  the  Lord. — ver.  5.  Wherefore  the  Lord  his  'God  delivered 
him  into  the  hand  of  the  king  of  Syria,  and  they  smote  him,  and  carried  away 
a  great  multitude  of  them  captive  and  brought  them  to  Damascus ;  and  he  was 
also  delivered  into  the  hand  of  the  king  of  Israel,  who  smvm  him  -with  a  great 
slaughter. 

Ver.  6.  And  Pekah  (king  of  Israel)  slew  in  Judah  an  hundred  and  twenty 
thousand  in  out  day.— ver.  8.  And  the  children  of  Israel  carried  away  captivt 
vf  their  brethren  'v><Miundred  thousand  women,  sons,  and  daughters. 


ntOPHECTES.  163 

P.ut  the  case  is,  that  the  child  of  which  Isaiah  speaks  waa 
his  own  child,  with  which  his  wife  or  his  mistress  was  then 
pregnant ;  for  he  says  in  the  next  chapter,  v.  2,  "  And  1 
took  unto  me  faithful  witnesses,  to  record,  Uriah  the  priest, 
and  Zechanah  the  son  of  Jeberechiah  •  and  I  went  unto  the 
prophetess,  and  she  conceived  and  hare  a  son  •"  and  he  says, 
at  ver.  18  of  the  same  chapter,  "  Behold  I  and  the  children 
whom  the  Lord  hath  given  me  are  for  signs  and  for  wonders 
in  Israel" 

It  may  not  be  improper  here  to  observe,  that  the  word 
translated  a  virgin  in  Isaiah,  does  not  signify  a  virgin  in 
Hebrew,  but  merely  a  young  woman.  The  tense  also  is 
falsified  in  the  translation.  Levi  gives  the  Hebrew  text  of 
the  14th  ver.  of  the  7th  chap,  of  Isaiah,  and  the  translation 
in  English  with  it — "  Behold  a  young  woman  is  with  child 
and  beareth  a  son"  The  expression,  says  he,  is  in  the  pre- 
sent tense.  This  translation  agrees  with  the  other  circum- 
stances, related  of  the  birth  of  this  child,  which  was  to  be  a 
sign  to  Ahaz.  But  as  the  true  translation  could  not  have 
been  imposed  upon  the  world  as  a  prophecy  of  a  child  to  be 
born  seven  hundred  years  afterwards,  the  Christian  transla- 
tors have  falsified  the  original :  and  instead  of  making 
Isaiah  to  say,  behold  a  young  woman  is  with  child  and  beareth 
a  son — they  make  him  to  say,  behold  a  virgin  shall  conceive 
and  bear  a  son.  It  is,  however,  only  necessary  for  a  person 
to  read  the  7th  and  8th  chapters  of  Isaiah,  and  he  will  be 
convinced  that  the  passage  in  question  is  no  prophecy  of  the 
person  called  Jesus  Christ.  I  pass  on  to  the  second  passage 
quoted  from  the  Old  Testament  by  the  New,  as  a  prophecy 
of  Jesus  Christ. 

Matthew,  chaj).  ii.  ver.  1.  "  Now  when  Jesus  was  born 
in  Bethlehem  of  Judah,  in  the  days  of  Herod  the  king, 
behold  there  came  wise  men  from  the  east  to  Jerusalem — 
saying,  where  is  he  that  is  born  king  of  the  Jews  ?  for  we 
have  seen  his  star  in  the  east,  and  are  come  to  worship  him. 
When  Herod,  the  king,  heard  these  things,  he  was  troubled, 
and  all  Jerusalem  with  him — and  when  he  had  gathered  all 
the  chief  priets  and  scribes  of  the  people  together,  he  de- 
manded of  them  where  Christ  should  be  born — and  they 
said  unto  him  in  Bethlehem,  in  the  land  of  Judea :  for  thus 
it  is  written  by  the  prophet — and  thou  Bethlehem,  in  the 
land  of  Judea,  art  not  the  least  among  the  Princes  of 
Judea,  for  out  of  thee  shall  come  a  Governor  that  shall  rule 
my  people  I&rael"  This  passage  is  in  Micah*  chap.  5.  ver.  2. 


164  EXAMINATION    O? 

I  pass  over  the  absurdity  of  seeingand  foil  )wing  a  star  in 
the  day-time,  as  a  man  would  a  Will  with  the  wisp,  or  a 
candle  and  lantern  at  night ;  and  also  that  of  seeing  it  in 
the  east,  when  themselves  came  from  the  east ;  for  could 
such  a  thing  be  seen  at  all  to  serve  them  for  a  guide,  it  must 
be  in  the  west  to  them.  I  confine  myself  solely  to  the  pas- 
sage called  a  prophecy  of  Jesus  Christ. 

The  book  of  Micah,  in  the  passage  above  quoted,  chap.  v. 
ver.  2,  is  speaking  of  some  person  without  mentioning  his 
name  from  whom  some  great  achievements  were  expected ; 
but  the  description  he  gives  of  this  person  at  the  5th  verse, 
proves  evidently  that  it  is  not  Jesus  Christ,  for  he  says  at 
the  5th  ver.  "  and  this  man  shall  be  the  peace  when  the 
Assyrian  shall  come  into  our  land,  and  when  he  shall  tread 
in  our  palaces,  then  shall  we  raise  up  war  against  him  (that 
is,  against  the  Assyrian)  seven  shepherds  and  eight  principal 
men — v.  6.  And  they  shall  waste  the  land  of  Assyria  with 
the  sword,  and  the  land  of  Nimrod  on  the  entrance  thereof : 
thus  shall  He  (the  person  spoken  of  at  the  head  of  the 
second  verse)  deliver  us  from  the  Assyrian  when  he  cometh 
into  our  land,  and  when  he  treadeth  within  our  borders." 

This  is  so  evidently  descriptive  of  a  military  chief,  that  it 
cannot  be  applied  to  Christ  without  outraging  the  character 
they  pretend  to  give  us  of  him.  Besides  which,  the  circum- 
stance of  the  times  here  spoken  of,  and  those  of  the  times 
in  which  Christ  is  said  to  have  lived,  are  in  contradiction  to 
each  other.  It  was  the  Romans,  and  not  the  Assyrians, 
that  had  conquered  and  were  in  the  land  of  Judea,  and  trod 
i/ti  their  palaces  when  Christ  was  born,  and  w'hen  he  died, 
and  so  far  from  his  driving  them  out,  it  was  they  who  signed 
the  warrant  for  his  execution,  and  he  suffered  under  it. 

Having  thus  shown  that  this  is  no  prophecy  of  Jesus 
Christ,  I  pass  on  to  the  third  passage  quoted  from  the  Old 
Testament  by  the  New,  as  a  prophecy  of  him. 

This,  like  the  first  I  have  spoken  of,  is  introduced  by  a 
dream.  Joseph  dreameth  another  dream,  and  dreameth  that 
he  seeth  another  angel.  The  account  begins  at  the  13th  v. 
of  2d  chap,  of  Matthew. 

"The  angel  of  the  Lord  appeared  to  Joseph  in" a  dream, 
saying,  Arise  and  take  the  young  child  and  his  mother  and 
flee  into  Egypt,  and  be  thou  there  until  I  bring  thee  word : 
For  Herod  will  seek  the  life  of  the  young  child  to  destroy 
him.  "When  he  arose  he  took  the  young  child  and  his  mother 
by  night  and  departed  into  Egypt — and  was  there  until  tiicj 


THE   PROPHECIES.  165 

death  of  Herod,  that  it  mighfr  be  fulfilled  which  was  spoken 
of  the  Lord  by  the  prophet,  saying,  Out  of  Egypt  1  have 
called  my  son. 

This  passage  is  in  the  book  of  Hosea,  chap.  xi.  ver.  1. 
The  words  are,  "  When  Israel  was  a  child  then  I  loved  him 
and  called  my  son  out  of  Egypt — As  they  called  them,  so 
they  went  from  them,  they  sacrificed  unto  Balaam  and 
burnt  incense  to  graven  images." 

This  passage,  talsely  called  a  prophecy  of  Christ,  refers  to 
the  children  of  Israel  coming  out  of  Egypt  in  the  time  of 
Pharaoh,  and  to  the  idolatry  they  committed  afterwards. 
To  make  it  apply  to  Jesus  Christ,  he  must  then  be  the  per- 
son who  sacrificed  unto  Baalam  and  "burnt  incense  to  graven 
images,  for  the  person  called  out  of  Egypt  by  the  collective 
name,  Israel,  and  the  persons  committing  this  idolatry,  arc 
the  same  persons,  or  the  descendants  from  them.  This, 
then,  can  be  no  prophecy  of  Jesus  Christ,  unless  they  are 
willing  to  make  an  idolater  of  him.  I  pass  on  to  the  fourth 
passage,  called,  a  prophecy  by  the  writer  of  the  book  of 
Matthew. 

This  is  introduced  by  a  story  told  by  nobody  but  himself, 
and  scarcely  believed  by  any  body,  of  the  slaughter  of  all 
the  children  under  two  years  old,  by  the  command  of  Herod. 
A  thing  which  it  is  not  probable  should  be  done  by  Herod, 
as  he  only  held  an  office  under  the  Roman  government,  to 
which  appeals  could  always  be  had,  as  we  see  in  the  case  of 

Matthew,  however,  having  made  or  told  his  story,  says, 
chap.  ii.  v.  17. — "  Then  was  fulfilled  that  which  was  spoken 
by  Jeremiah,  the  prophet,  saying, — In  Ramah  was  there  a 
voice  heard,  lamentation,  weeping  and  great  mourning  / 
Rachel  weeping  for  her  children,  and  would  not  be  com- 
forted because  they  were  not" 

This  passage  is  in  Jeremiah,  chap.  xxxi.  ver.  15,  and  this 
verse,  when  separated  from  the  verses  before  and  after  it, 
and  which  explains  its  application,  might,  with  equal  pro- 
priety, be  applied  to  every  case  of  wars,  sieges  and  other 
violences,  such  as  the  Christians  themselves  have  often  done 
to  the  Jews,  where  mothers  have  lamented  the  loss  of  their 
children.  There  is  nothing  in  the  verse,  taken  singly,  that 
designates  or  points  out  any  particular  application  of  it, 
otherwise  than  it  points  to  some  circumstances  which,  at  the 
time  of  writing  it,  had  already  happened,  and  not  to  a  thing 
yet  to  happen  for  the  verse  is  in  the  preter  or  past  tense. 


166  EXAMINATION   OF 

\ 

I  go  to  explain  the  case  and, show  the  application  of  the 
verse. 

Jeremiah  lived  in  the  time  that  Nebuchadnezzar  besieged, 
took,  plundered,  and  destroyed  Jerusalem,  and  led  the  Jews 
captive  to  Babylon.  He  carried  his  violence  against  the 
Jews  to  every  extreme.  He  slew  the  sons  of  king  Zedekiah 
before  his  face,  he  then  put  out  the  eyes  of  Zedekiah,  and 
kept  him  in  prison  till  the  day  of  his  death. 

It  is  of  this  time  of  sorrow  and  suffering  to  the  Jews  that 
Jeremiah  is  speaking.  Their  temple  was  destroyed,  their 
land  desolated,  their  nation  and  government  entirely  broken 
up,  and  themselves,  men,  women  and  children,  carried  into 
captivity.  They  had  too  many  sorrows  of  their  own,  imme- 
diately before  their  eyes,  to  permit  them,  or  any  of  their 
chiefs,  to  be  employing  themselves  on  things  that  might,  or 
might  not,  happen  in  the  world  seven  hundred  years  after 
wards. 

It  is,  as  already  observed,  of  this  time  of  sorrow  and  suffer- 
ing to  the  Jews  that  Jeremiah  is  speaking  in  the  verse  in 
question.  In  the  two  next  verses,  the  16th  and  17th,  he  en- 
deavors to  console  the  sufferings  by  giving  them  hopes,  and, 
according  to  the  fashion  of  speaking  in  those  days,  assur- 
ances from  the  Lord,  that  their  sufferings  should  have  an 
end,  and  that  their  children  should  return  again  to  their  own 
children.  But  I  leave  the  verses  to  speak  for  themselves, 
and  the  Old  Testament  to  testify  against  the  ]STew. 

Jeremiah,  chap.  xxxi.  ver.  15. — "  Thus  saith  the  Lord,  a 
voice  was  heard  in  Raman  (it  is  in  the  preter  tense)  lamen- 
tation and  bitter  weeping :  Kachael  weeping  for  her  children 
"because  they  were  not." 

Terse  16. — "  Thus  saith  the  lord,  refrain  thy  voice  from 
weeping,  and  thine  eyes  from  tears ;  for  thy  work  shall  be 
rewarded,  said  the  Lord,  and  THEY  shall  come  again  from 
the  land  of  the  enemy" 

Verse  17. — "  And  there  is  hope  in  thine  end,  saith  the 
Lord,  that  thy  children  shall  come  again  to  their  own  bor- 
der." 

By  what  strange  ignorance  or  imposition  is  it,  that  the 
children  of  which  Jeremiah  speaks,  (meaning  the  people  of 
the  Jewish  nation,  scripturally  called  children  of  Israel,  and 
not  mere  infants  under  two  years  old,)  and  who  were  to  re- 
turn again  from  the  land  of  the  enemy,  and  come  again  into 
their  own  borders,  can  mean  the  children  that  Matthew 
makes  Herod  to  slaughter  ?  Could  those  return  again  from 


THE   PROPHECIES.  167 

the  land  of  the  enemy,  or  how  can  the  land  of  the  enemy  bo 
applied  to  them  ?  Could  they  come  again  to  their  own  bor- 
ders ?  Good  heavens !  How  has  the  world  been  imposed 
upon  by  Testament-makers,  priestcraft,  and  pretended  pro- 
phecies. I  pass  on  to  the  fifth  passage  called  a  prophecy  ot 
Jesue  Christ. 

This,  like  two  of  the  former,  is  introduced  by  dream. 
Joseph  dreamed  another  dream,  and  dreameth  of  another 
Angel.  And  Matthew  is  again  the  historian  of  the  dream 
and  the  dreamer.  If  it  were  asked  how  Matthew  coiud 
know  what  Joseph  dreamed,  neither  the  Bishop  nor  all  the 
Church  could  answer  the  question.  Perhaps  it  was  Matthew 
that  dreamed,  and  not  Joseph ;  that  is,  Joseph  dreamed  by 
proxy,  in  Matthew's  brain,  as  they  tell  us  Daniel  dreamed 
tor  IS  ebuchadnezzar.  But  be  this  as  it  may,  I  go  on  with 
my  subject. 

The  account  of  this  dream  is  in  Matthew,  chap.  ii.  ver. 
19. — "  But  when  Herod  was  dead,  behold  an  angel  of  the 
Lord  appeared  in  a  dream  to  Joseph  in  Egypt — Saying,  arise, 
and  take  the  young  child  and  its  mother  and  go  into  the 
land  of  Israel,  for  they  are  dead  which  sought  the  young 
child's  life — and  he  arose  and  took  the  young  child  and  his 
mother  and  came  into  the  land  of  Israel.  But  when  ho 
heard  that  Archelaus  did  reign  in  Judea  in  the  room  of  his 
father  Herod,  he  was  afraid  to  go  thither.  Notwithstanding 
being  warned  of  God  in  a  dream  (here  is  another  dream)  he 
turned  aside  into  the  parts  of  Galilee ;  and  he  came  and 
dwelt  in  a  city  called  Nazareth^  that  it  might  be  fulfilled 
which  was  spoken  by  the  prophets — He  shall  be  called  a 
Nazarine" 

Here  is  good  circumstantial  evidence  that  Matthew 
dreamed,  for  there  is  no  such  passage  in  all  the  Old  Testa- 
ment ;  and  I  invite  the  bishop  and  al»  the  priests  in  Christen- 
dom, including  those  of  America,  to  produce  it.  I  pass  on 
to  the  sixth  passage,  called  a  prophecy  of  Jesus  Christ. 

This,  as  Swift  says  on  another  occasion,  is  lugged  in  head 
and  slwulder.s  ;  it  need  only  to  be  seen  in  order  to  be  hooted 
as  a  forced  and  far-fetched  piece  of  imposition. 

Matthew,  chap.  iv.  v.  12.  "  Now  when  Jesus  heard  that 
John  was  cast  into  prison,  he  departed  into  Galilee — and 
leaving  Nazareth,  he  came  and  dwelt  in  Capernaum,  which 
is  upon  the  sea  coast,  in  the  borders  of  Zebulon  and  Neph 
thahm — That  it  might  be  fulfilled  which  was  spoken  by 
Esaias  (Isaiah)  the  prophet,  saying,  The  land  of  Zebulon  and 


166  EXAMINATION    OF 

the  land  of  Nepthalim,  ly  the  way  of  the  sea,  beyond  Jar* 
dan,  in  (Galilee  of  the  Gentiles — the  people  which  sat  in 
darkness  saw  great  light,  and  to  them  which  sat  in  the  region 
and  shadow  of  death,  light  is  springing  upon  them" 

I  wonder  Matthew  has  not  made  the  cris-cross-row,  or  the 
christ-cross-row  (I  know  not  how  the  priests  spell  it)  into  a 
prophecy.  He  might  as  well  have  done  this  as  cut  out  these 
unconnected  and  undescriptive  sentences  from  the  place  they 
stand  in  and  dubbed  them  with  that  title 

The  words,  however,  are  in  Isaiah,  chap.  ix.  verse  1,  2,  as 
follows : — 

"  Nevertheless  the  dimness  shall  not  be  such  as  was  in  her 
•^exation,  when  at  the  first  he  lightly  afflicted  the  land  of 
Zebulon  and  the  land  of  Nephthali,  and  afterwards  did  more 
grievously  afflict  her  hy  the  way  of  the  sea,  beyond  Jordan  in 
Galilee  of  the  nations" 

All  this  relates  to  two  circumstances  that  had  already  hap- 
pened, at  the  time  these  words  in  Isaiah  were  written.  The 
one,  where  the  land  of  Zebulon  and  Nephthali  had  been 
lightly  afflicted,  and  afterwards  more  grievously  by  the  way 
of  the  sea. 

But  observe,  reader,  how  Matthew  has  falsified  the  text, 
lie  begins  his  quotation  at  a  part  of  the  verse  where  there 
is  not  so  much  as  a  comma,  and  thereby  cuts  off  everything 
that  relates  to  the  first  affliction.  He  then  leaves  out  all  that 
relates  to  the  second  affliction,  and  by  this  means  leaves  out 
every  thing  that  makes  the  verse  intelligible,  and  reduces  it 
to  a  senseless  skeleton  of  names  of  towns. 

To  bring  this  imposition  of  Matthew  clearly  and  immedi- 
ately before  the  eye  of  the  reader,  I  will  repeat  the  verse, 
and  put  between  crotchets  the  words  he  has  left  out,  and 
put  in  Italics  those  he  has  preserved. 

[Nevertheless  the  dimness  shall  not  be  such  as  was  in  her 
vexation  when  at  the  first  he  lightly  afflicted]  the  land  of 
Zebulon  and  the  land  of  Nephthali,  [and  did  afterwards  more 
grievously  afflict  her]  by  the  way  of  the  sea  beyond  Jordan  in 
Galilee  of  the  nations" 

What  gross  imposition  is  it  to  gut,  as  the  phrase  is,  a  verse 
in  this  manner,  render  it  perfectly  senseless,  and  then  puff  it 
off  on  a  credulous  world  as  a  prophecy.  I  proceed  to  the 
next  verse. 

Yer.  2.  "  The  people  that  walked  in  darkness  have  seen  a 
great  light ;  they  that  dwell  in  the  land  of  the  shadow  of 
death,  upon  them  hath  the  light  shined.''  All  this  isliistor- 


THE   PROPHECIES.  109 

ical,  and  not  in  the  least  prophetical.  The  whole  is  in  the 
preter  tense :  it  speaks  of  things  that  had  been  accomplished 
at  the  time  the  words  were  written,  and  not  of  things  to  be 
accomplished  afterwards. 

As  then  the  passage  is  in  no  possible  sense  prophetical, 
nor  intended  to  be  so,  and  that  to  attempt  to  make  it  so,  is 
not  only  to  falsify  the  original,  but  to  commit  a  criminal 
imposition ;  it  is  matter  of  no  concern  to  us,  otherwise  than 
as  curiosity,  to  know  who  the  people  were  of  which  the  pas- 
sage speaks,  that  sat  in  darkness,  and  what  the  light  was 
that  shined  in  upon  them. 

If  we  look  into  the  preceding  chapter,  the  8th,  of  which 
the  9th  is  only  a  continuation,  we  shall  find  the  writer  speak- 
ing, at  the  19th  verse,  of  "  witches  and  wizards  who  peep 
about  and  mutter"  and  of  people  who  made  application  to 
them ;  and  he  preaches  and  exhorts  them  against  this  dark- 
some practice.  It  is  of  this  people,  and  01  this  darksome 
practice,  or  walking  in  darkness,  that  he  is  speaking  at  the 
2d  verse  of  the  9th  chapter ;  and  with  respect  to  the  light 
that  had  shined  in  upon  them,  it  refers  entirely  to  his  own 
ministry,  and  to  the  boldness  of  it,  which  opposed  itself  to 
that  of  the  witches  and  wizards  who  peeped  about  and  mut- 
tered. 

Isaiah  is,  upon  the  whole,  a  wild  disorderly  writer,  pre- 
serving in  general  no  clear  chain  of  perception  in  the 
arrangement  of  his  ideas,  and  consequently  producing  no 
defined  conclusions  from  them.  It  is  the  wildness  of  his 
style,  the  confusion  of  his  ideas,  and  the  ranting  metaphors 
he  employs,  that  have  afforded  so  many  opportunities  to 
priestcraft  in  some  cases,  and  to  superstition  in  others,  to 
impose  those  defects  upon  the  world  as  prophecies  of  Jesus 
Christ.  Finding  no  direct  meaning  in  them,  and  not  know- 
ing what  to  make  of  them,  and  supposing  at  the  same  time 
they  were  intended  to  have  a  meaning,  they  supplied  the 
defect  by  inventing  a  meaning  of  their  own,  ana  called  it 
his.  I  have,  however,  in  this  place  done  Isaiah  the  justice 
to  rescue  him  from  the  claws  of  Matthew,  who  has  torn  him 
unmercifully  to  pieces  ;  and  from  the  imposition  or  ignorance 
of  priests  and  commentators,  by  letting  Isaiah  speak  for 
himself. 

If  the  words  walking  in  darkness,  and  light  breaking  in, 
could  hi  any  case  be  applied  prophetically,  which  they  can- 
not be,  they  would  better  apply  to  the  times  we  now  live  in 
to  any  ither.  The  world  has  "  walked  in  darkness  " 


170  EXAMINATION   OF 

tor  eighteen  hundred  years,  both  as  to  religion  and  govern- 
ment, and  it  is  only  since  the  American  Revolution  began 
that  light  has  broken  in.  The  belief  of  one  God,  whose 
attributes  are  revealed  to  us  in  the  book  or  scripture  of  the 
creation,  which  no  human  hand  can  counterfeit  or  falsify, 
and  not  in  the  written  or  printed  book  which,  as  Matthew 
has  shown,  can  be  altered  or  falsified  by  ignorance  or  design, 
is  now  making  its  way  among  us :  and  as  to  government, 
the  light  is  already  gone  forth,  and  whilst  men  ought  to  be 
careful  not  to  be  blinded  by  the  excess  of  it,  as  at  a  certain 
time  in  France,  when  everything  was  Robespierrean  violence, 
they  ought  to  reverence,  and  even  to  adore  it,  with  all  the 
firmness  and  perseverance  that  true  wisdom  can  inspire. 

I  pass  on  to  the  seventh  passage,  called  a  prophecy  of 
Jesus  Christ. 

Matthew,  chap.  viii.  ver.  16.  "  When  the  evening  was 
come,  they  brought  unto  him  (Jesus)  many  that  were  pos- 
sessed with  devils,  and  he  cast  out  the  spirit  with  his  word, 
and  healed  all  that  were  sick. — That  it  might  be  fulfilled 
which  was  spoken  by  Esaias  (Isaiah)  the  prophet,  saying, 
himself  took  our  infirmities,  and  bare  our  sicknesses. 

This  affair  of  people  being  possessed  by  devils,  and  oi 
casting  them  out,  was  the  fable  of  the  day  when  the  books 
of  the  New  Testament  were  written.  It  had  not  existence 
at  any  other  time.  The  books  of  the  Old  Testament  men- 
tion no  such  thing ;  the  people  of  the  present  day  know  of 
no  such  thing ;  nor  does  the  history  of  any  people  or  country 
speak  of  such  a  thing.  It  starts  upon  us  all  at  once  in  the 
book  of  Matthew,  and  is  altogether  an  invention  of  the  New 
Testament-makers  and  the  Christian  church.  The  book  of 
Matthew  is  the  first  book  where  the  word  Devil  is  mentioned.* 
"We  read  in  some  of  the  books  of  the  Old  Testament  of 
things  called  familiar  spirits,  the  supposed  companions  of 
people  called  witches  and  wizards.  It  was  no  other  than 
the  trick  of  pretended  conjurors  to  obtain  money  from  credu- 
lous and  ignorant  people,  or  the  fabricated  charge  of 
superstitious  malignancy  against  unfortunate  and  decrepit 
old  age. 

But  the  idea  of  a  familiar  spirit,  if  we  can  alfix  any  idea 
to  the  term,  is  exceedingly  different  to  that  of  being  pos- 
sessed by  a  devil.  In  the  one  case,  the  supposed  familiar 
spirit  is  a  dexterous  agent,  that  comes  and  goes  and  does  aa 
he  is  bidden ;  in  the  other,  he  is  a  turbulent  roaring  monster, 

*  The  word  devil  is  a  personification  of  the  word  eoiL 


THE   PROPHECIES.  171 

that  tears  ana  tortures  the  body  into  convulsions.  Reader, 
whoever  thou  art,  put  thy  trust  in  thy  Creator,  make  use  of 
the  reason  he  endowed  thee  with,  and  cast  from  thee  all  SUP  I 
fables. 

The  passage  alluded  to  by  Matthew,  for  as  a  quotation  it 
is  false,  is'in  Isaiah,  chap.  liii.  ver.  4,  which  is  as  follows: 

"  Surely  lie  (the  person  of  whom  Isaiah  is  speaking  of) 
hath  borne  our  griefs  and  carried  our  sorrows."  It  is  in  the 
preter  tense. 

Here  is  nothing  about  casting  out  devils,  nor  curing  of 
sicknesses.  The  passage,  therefore,  so  far  from  being  a 
prophecy  of  Christ,  is  not  even  applicable  as  a  circumstance. 

Isaiah,  or  at  least  the  writer  of  the  book  that  bears  his 
name,  employs  the  whole  of  this  chapter,  the  53d,  in  lament- 
ing the  sufferings  of  some  deceased  persons,  of  whom  he 
speaks  very  pathetically.  It  is  a  monody  on  the  death  of  a 
friend ;  but  he  mentions  not  the  name  of  me  person,  nor  gives 
any  ciren instance  of  him  by  which  he  can  be  personally 
known ;  and  it  is  this  silence,  which  is  evidence  of  nothing, 
that  Matthew  has  laid  hold  of  to  put  the  name  of  Christ  to 
it ;  as  if  the  chiefs  of  the  Jews,  whose  sorrows  were  then 
great,  and  the  times  they  lived  in  big  with  danger,  were 
never  thinking  about  their  own  affairs,  nor  the  fate  of  their 
own  friends,  but  were  continually  running  a  wild-goose  chase 
into  futurity. 

To  make  a  monody  into  a  prophecy  is  an  absurdity.  The 
characters  and  circumstances  of  men,  even  in  different  ages 
of  the  world,  are  so  much  alike,  that  what  is  said  of  one  may 
with  propriety  be  said  of  many  ;  but  this  fitness  does  not 
make  the  passage  into  a  prophecy ;  and  none  but  an.  iin- 
poster  or  a  bigot  would  call  it  so. 

Isaiah,  in  deploring  the  hard  fate  and  loss  of  his  friend, 
mentions  nothing  of  mm  but  what  the  human  lot  of  man  is 
subject  to.  All  the  cases  he  states  of  him,  his  persecutions, 
hi»  imprisonment,  his  patience  in  suffering,  and  his  persever- 
ance in  principle,  are  all  within  the  line  of  nature :  they 
belong  exclusively  to  none,  and  may  with  justness  be  said 
of  many.  But  ii  Jesus  Christ  was  the  person  the  church 
represents  him  to  be,  that  which  would  exclusively  apply  to 
him,  must  be  something  that  could  not  apply  to  any  other 
person ;  something  beyond  the  line  of  nature ;  something 
beyond  the  lot  of  mortal  man  ;  and  there  are  no  such  ex- 
pressions in  this  chapter,  nor  any  other  chapter  in  the  Old 
Testament. 


172  EXAMINATION   OF 

It  is  no  exclusive  description  "o  say  ot  a  person,  as  is  salt 
of  the  person  Isaiah  is  lamenting  in  this  chapter.  He  was 
^jyressed  and  he  was  afflicted,  yet  he  opened  not  his  mouth; 
rs.  is  brought  as  a  lamb  to  the  slaughter,  and  as  a  sheep 
before  his  shearers  is  dumb,  so  he  opened  not  his  mouth. 
This  may  be  said  of  thousands  of  persons,  who  have  suffered 
oppressions  and  unjust  death  with  patience,  silence,  and  per- 
fect resignation. 

Grotius,  whom  the  bishop  esteems  a  most  learned  man, 
and  who  certainly  was  so,  supposes  that  the  person  of  whom 
Isaiah  is  speaking,  is  Jeremiah.  Grotius  is  led  into  this 
opinion,  from  the  agreement  there  is  between  the  description 
given  by  Isaiah,  and  the  case  of  Jeremiah,  as  stated  in  the 
book  that  bears  his  name.  If  Jeremiah  was  an  innocent 
man,  and  not  a  traitor  in  the  interest  of  Nebuchadnezzar, 
when  Jerusalem  was  besieged  his  case  was  hard ;  he  was 
accused  by  his  countrymen,  was  persecuted,  oppressed,  and 
imprisoned,  and  he  says  of  himself,  (see  Jeremiah,  chap.  ii. 
ver.  19,)  "But  as  for  me,  2  was  like  a  lamb  or  an  ox  that  is 
brought  to  the  slaughter" 

I  should  be  inclined  to  the  same  opinion  with  Grotius,  had 
Isaiah  lived  at  the  time  when  Jeremiah  underwent  the 
cruelties  of  which  he  speaks ;  but  Isaiah  died  about  fifty 
years  before ;  and  it  is  of  a  person  of  his  own  time,  whose 
case  Isaiah  is  lamenting  in  the  chapter  in  question,  and 
which  imposition  and  bigotry,  mere  than  seven  hundred 
years  afterwards,  perverted  into  a  prophecy  of  a  person  they 
call  Jesus  Christ. 

I  pass  on  the  eighth  passage  called  a  prophecy  of  Jesus 
Christ. 

Matthew,  chap.  xii.  ver.  14.  "  Then  the  Pharisees  went 
out  and  held  a  council  against  him,  how  they  might  destroy 
him — But  when  Jesus  knew  it  he  withdrew  himself ;  and 

great  numbers  followed  him  and  he  healed  them  all — and 
e  charged  them  that  they  should  not  make  him  known ; 
That  it  might  be  fulfilled  which  was  spoken  by  Esaias  (Isaiah) 
the  prophet,  saying, 

"  Behold  my  servant  whom  I  have  chosen ;  my  beloved 
in  whom  my  soul  is  well  pleased,  I  will  put  my  spirit  upon 
Aim,  and  he  shall  show  judgment  to  the  Gentiles — he  shall 
not  strive  nor  cry,  neither  shall  any  man  hear  his  voice  in 
the  streets — a  bruised  reed  shall  he  not  break,  and  smokeing 
flax  shall  he  not  quench,  till  he  sends  forth  judgment  unto 
victory — and  in  his  name  shall  the  Gentiles  trust." 


THE   PROPHECIES. 


173 


In  the  first  place,  this  passage  hath  not  the  least  relation 
to  the  purpose  for  which  it  is  quoted 

Matthew  says,  that  the  Pharisees  held  a  council  against 
Jesus  to  destroy  him — that  Jesus  withdrew  himself — 
that  great  numbers  followed  him — that  he  healed  them 
— and  that  he  charged  them  they  should  not  make  him 
known. 

But  the  passage  Matthew  has  quoted  as  being  fulfilled  by 
these  circumstances,  does  not  so  much  as  apply  to  any  one 
of  them.  It  has  nothing  to  do  with  the  Pharisees  hold- 
ing a  council  to  destroy  Jesus — with  his  withdrawing 
himself — with  great  numbers  following  him — with  his  heaP 
ing  them — nor  with  his  charging  them  not  to  make  him 
known. 

The  purpose  for  which  the  passage  is  quoted,  and  the  pas- 
sage itself,  are  as  remote  from  each  other,  as  nothing  from 
something.  But  the  case  is,  that  people  have  been  so  long 
in  the  habit  of  reading  the  books,  called  the  Bible  and  Tes- 
tament, with  their  eyes  shut,  and  their  senses  locked  up, 
that  the  most  stupid  inconsistencies  have  passed  on  them  for 
truth,  and  imposition  for  prophecy.  The  all-wise  Creator 
has  been  dishonoured  by  being  made  the  author  of  fable,  and. 
the  human  mind  degraded  by  believing  it. 

In  this  passage  as  in  that  last  mentioned,  the  name  of  the 
person  of  whom  the  passage  speaks  is  not  given,  and  we  are 
left  in  the  dark  respecting  nim.  It  is  this  defect  in  the  his- 
tory, that  bigotry  and  imposition  have  laid  hold  of,  to  call  it 
prophecy. 

Had  Isaiah  lived  in  the  time  of  Cyrus,  the  passage  would 
descriptively  apply  to  him.  As  king  of  Persia,  his 
•  authority  was  great  among  the  Gentiles,  and  it  is  of  such  a 
character  the  passage  speaks ;  and  his  friendship  for  the 
Jews  whom  he  liberated  from  captivity,  and  who  might 
then  be  compared  to  a  bruised  reed^  was  extensive.  But 
this  description  does  not  apply  to  Jesus  Christ,  who  had  nc 
authority  among  the  Gentiles  ;  and  as  to  his  own  country- 
men, figuratively  described  by  the  bruised  reed,  it  was  they 
who  crucified  him.  Neither  can  it  be  said  of  him  that  he 
did  not  cry,  and  that  his  voice  was  not  heard  in  the  street. 
As  a  preacher  it  was  his  business  to  be  heard,  and  we  are 
told  that  he  travelled  about  the  country  for  that  purpose. 
Matthew  has  given  a  long  sermon,  which  (if  his  authority  is 
good,  but  which  is  much  to  be  doubted  since  he  imposes  so 
much,)  Jesus  preached  to  i  multitude  upon  a  mountain,  and 


174  EXAMINATION   OP 

it  would  be  a  quibble  to  say  that  a  mountain  is  not  a  street, 
since  it  is  a  place  equally  as  public. 

The  last  verse  in  the  passage  (the  4th)  as  it  stands  in 
Isaiah,  and  which  Matthew  has  not  quoted,  says,  "  He  shall 
not  fail  nor  be  discouraged  till  he  have  set  judgment  in  the 
earth  and  the  isles  shall  wait  for  his  law."  This  also  applies 
to  Cyrus.  He  was  not  discouraged,  he  did  not  fail,  he  con- 
quered all  Babylon,  liberated  the  Jews,  and  established  laws. 
But  this  cannot  be  said  of  Jesus  Christ,  who  in  the  passage 
before  us,  according  to  Matthew,  withdrew  himself  for  fear 
of  the  Pharisees,  and  charged  the  people  that  followed  him 
not  to  make  it  known  where  he  was ;  and  who,  according 
to  other  parts  of  the  Testament,  was  continually  moving 
from  place  to  place  to  avoid  being  apprehended.* 

But  it  is  immaterial  to  us,  at  this  distance  of  time,  to  know 

*  In  the  second  part  of  the  Age  of  Reason,  I  have  shown  that  the  book  as- 
cribed to  Isaiah  is  not  only  miscellaneous  as  to  matter,  but  as  to  authorship ; 
that  there  are  parts  in  it  which  could  not  be  written  by  Isaiah,  because  they 
speak  of  things  one  hundred  and  fifty  years  after  he  was  dead.  The  instance 
I  have  given  of  this,  in  that  work,  corresponds  with  the  subject  I  am  upon,  at 
least  a  little  better  than  Matthew's  introduction  and  his  quotation. 

Isaiah  lived,  the  latter  part  of  his  life,  >n  the  time  of  Hezekiah,  and  it  waa 
about  one  hundred  and  fifty  years,  from  the  death  of  Hezekiah  to  the  first  year 
of  the  reign  of  Cyrus,  when  Cyrus  published  a  proclamation,  which  is  given  in 
the  first  chapter  of  the  book  of  Ezra,  for  the  return  of  the  Jews  to  Jerusalem. 
It  cannot  be  doubted,  at  least  it  ought  not  to  be  doubted,  that  the  Jews  would 
feel  an  affectionate  gratitude  for  this  act  of  benevolent  Justice,  and  it  is  natural 
they  would  express  that  gratitude  in  the  customary  style,  bombastical  and  hy- 
perbolical as  it  was,  which  they  used  on  extraordinary  occasions,  and  which 
was,  and  still  is  in  practice  with  all  the  eastern  nations. 

The  instance  to  which  I  refer,  and  which  is  given  in  the  second  part  of  the 
Age  of  Reason,  is  the  last  verse  of  the  44th  chapter,  and  the  beginning  of  the 
45th — in  these  words  :  "  That  saith  of  Cyrus,  he  is  my  shepherd  and  shall  per- 
form all  my  pleasure  :  even  saying  to  Jerusalem  thou  shall  be  built,  and  to  the 
Temple,  thy  foundation  shall  be  laid.  Thus  saith  the  Lord  to  his  anointed,  to 
Cyrus,  whose  right  hand  I  have  holden  to  subdue  nations  before  him  ;  and  I  will 
loose  the  loins  of  kings,  to  open  before  him  the  two-leaved  gates,  and  the  gates 
shall  not  be  shut." 

This  complementary  address  is  in  the  present  tense,  which  shows  that  the 
things  of  which  it  speaks  were  in  existence  at  the  time  of  writing  it ;  and  con- 
sequently that  the  author  must  have  been  at  least  one  hundred  and  fifty  yeara 
later  than  Isaiah,  and  that  the  book  which  bears  his  name  is  a  compilation. 
The  Proverbs  called  Solomon's,  and  the  Psalms  called  David's,  are  of  the  same 
kind.  The  two  last  verses  of  the  second  book  of  Chronicles,  and  the  three  first 
verses  of  the  first  chapter  of  Ezra,  are  word  for  word  the  same ;  which  show 
that  the  compilers  of  the  Bible  mixed  the  writings  of  different  authors  to- 
gether, and  put  them  under  some  common  head. 

As  we  have  here  an  instance  in  the  44th  and  45th  chapters  of  the  introduc- 
tion of  the  name  of  Cyrus  into  a  book  to  which  it  cannot  belong,  it  affords  good 
ground  to  conclude,  that  the  passage  in  the  42d  chapter,  in  which  the  charac- 
ter of  Cyrus  is  given  without  his  name,  has  been  introduced  in  like  manner, 
and  that  the  person  there  spok*  i  of  is  Cyrus. 


THE   PBOPHEOIES.  176 

who  the  person  was :  it  is  sufficient  for  the  purpose  I  am  upon, 
that  of  detecting  fraud  and  falsehood,  to  know  who  it 
was  not,  and  to  show  it  was  not  the  person  called  Jesus 
Christ. 

I  pass  on  to  the  ninth  passage  called  a  prophecy  of  Jesus 
Christ. 

Matthew,  chap.  xxi.  v.  1.  "  And  when  they  drew  nigh 
unto  Jerusalem,  and  were  come  to  Bethpage,  unto  the  mount 
of  Olives,  then  Jesus  Bent  two  of  his  disciples,  saying  unto 
them,  go  into  the  village  over  against  you,  and  straightway 
ye  shall  find  an  ass  tied,  and  a  colt  with  her,  loose  them  and 
bring  them  unto  me — and  if  any  man  say  ought  to  you,  ye 
shall  say,  the  Lord  hath  need  of  them,  and  straightway  he 
will  send  them. 

"  All  this  was  done  that  it  might  be  fulfilled  which  was 
spoken  by  the  prophet,  saying,  Tdl  ye  the  daughter  of  Sion, 
behold  thy  king  cometh  unto  thee  meek,  and  sitting  upon  an 
ass,  and  a  colt  the  foal  of  an  ass" 

Poor  ass !  let  it  be  some  consolation  amidst  all  thy  suffer- 
ings, that  if  the  heathen  world  erected  a  bear  into  a  con- 
stellation, the  Christian  world  has  elevated  thee  into  a 
prophecy. 

This  passage  is  in  Zechariah,  chap.  ix.  ver.  9,  and  is  ono 
of  the  whims  of  friend  Zechariah  to  congratulate  his  country- 
men, who  were  then  returning  from  captivity  in  Babylon, 
and  himself  with  them,  to  Jerusalem.  It  has  no  concern 
with  any  other  subject.  It  is  strange  that  apostles,  priests, 
and  commentators,  never  permit,  or  never  suppose,  the  Jews 
to  be  speaking  of  their  own  affairs.  Every  thing  in  the 
Jewish  books  is  perverted  and  distorted  into  meanings  never 
intended  by  the  writers.  Even  the  poor  ass  must  not  be  a 
Jew-ass  but  a  Christian-ass.  I  wonder  they  did  not  make 
an  apostle  of  him,  or  a  bishop,  or  at  least  make  him  speak 
and  prophecy.  He  could  have  lifted  up  his  voice  as  loud  as 
any  of  them. 

Zechariah,  in  the  first  chapter  of  his  book,  indulges  him- 
self in  several  whims  on  the  joy  of  getting  back  to  Jerusa- 
lem. He  says  at  the  8th  verse,  "  I  saw  by  night  (Zechariah 
was  a  sharp-sighted  seer)  and  behold  a  mSh  setting  on  a  red 
horse,  (yes,  reader,  a  red  horse,}  and  he  stood  among  the 
myrtle  trees  that  were  in  the  bottom,  and  behind  him  were 
red  horses  speckled  and  white."  He  says  nothing  about 
green  horses  nor  blue  horses,  perhaps  because  it  is  difficult 
to  distinguisV  green  from  blue  by  night,  but  a  Christian  c-au 


176  EXAMINATION    OF 

have  no  doubt  they  were  there,  because  "faith  is  the  evidence 
of  things  not  seen." 

Zechariah  then  introduces  an  angel  among  his  horses,  but 
he  docs  not  tell  us  what  colour  the  angel  was  of,  whether  black 
or  white,  nor  whether  he  came  to  buy  horses,  or  only  to  look 
at  them  as  curiosities,  for  certainly  they  were  of  that  kind. 
Be  this  however  as  it  may,  he  enters  into  conversation  with 
this  angel,  on  the  joyful  affair  of  getting  back  to  Jerusalem, 
and  he  saith  at  the  16th  verse,  "  Therefore,  thus  saith  the 
Lord,  1  am  returned  to  Jerusalem  with  mercies  ;  my  house 
shall  be  built  in  it  saith  the  Lord  of  hosts,  and  a  line  shall 
be  stretched  forth  upon  Jerusalem."  An  expression  signi- 
fying the  rebuilding  the  city. 

All  this,  whimsical  and  imaginary  as  it  is,  sufficiently 
proves  that  it  was  the  entry  of  the  Jews  into  Jerusalem 
from  captivity,  and  not  the  entry  of  Jesus  Christ,  seven 
liundred  years  afterwards,  that  ie  the  subject  upon  which 
Zechariah  is  always  speaking. 

As  to  the  expression  of  riding  upon  an  ass,  which  com- 
mentators represent  as  a  sign  of  humility  in  Jesus  Christ, 
the  case  is,  he  never  was  so  well  mounted  before.  The  asses 
of  those  countries  are  large  and  well-proportioned,  and  were 
anciently  the  chief  of  riding  animals.  Their  beasts  of 
burden,  and  which  served  also  for  the  conveyance  of  the 
poor,  were  camels  and  dromedaries.  We  read  in  Judges, 
•chap.  x.  ver,  4.  that  "  Jair,  (one  of  the  Judges  of  Israel,) 
had  thirty  sons  that  rode  on  thirty  ass-colts,  and  they  had 
thirty  cities."  But  commentators  distort  every  thing. 

There  is  besides  very  reasonable  grounds  to  conclude  that 
ihis  story  of  Jesus  riding  publicly  into  Jerusalem,  accompa- 
nied, as  it  is  said  at  the  8th  and  9th  verses,  by  a  great  mul- 
titude, shouting  and  rejoicing,  and  spreading  their  garments 
by  the  way,  is  altogether  a  story  destitute  of  truth. 

In  the  last  passage  called  a  prophecy  that  I  examined, 
Jesus  is  represented  as  withdrawing,  that  is,  running  away, 
and  concealing  himself  for  fear  of  being  apprehended,  and 
charging  the  people  that  were  with  him  not  to  make  him 
known.  No  new  circumstance  had  arisen  in  the  interim  to 
change  his  condition  for  the  better ;  yet  here'  he  is  repre- 
sented as  making  his  public  entry  into  the  same  city  from 
which  he  had  fled  for  safety.  The  two  cases  contradict  each 
other  so  much,  that  if  both  are  not  false,  one  of  them  at 
least  can  scarcely  be  true.  For  my  own  part,  I  do  not 
believe  there  is  one  word  of  historical  truth  in  the  whole 


THE   PROPHECIES.  177 

£ook.  I  loot  upon  it  at  best  to  be  a  romance  :  the  princi- 
pal personage  of  which  is  an  imaginary  or  allegorical  char- 
acter founded  upon  some  tale,  and  in  which  the  moral  is  in 
many  parts  good,  and  the  narrative  part  very  badly  and 
blunderingly  written. 

I  pass  on  to  the  tenth  passage,  called  a  prophecy  of  Jesug 
Christ. 

Matthew,  chap.  xxvi.  ver.  51.  "  And  behold  one  of  them 
which  was  with  Jesus  (meaning  Peter)  stretched  out  his 
hand,  and  drew  his  sword,  and  struck  a  servant  of  the  high 
priest,  and  smote  off  his  ear.  Then  said  Jesus  unto  him ; 
Put  up  again  thy  sword  into  its  place,  for  all  they  that  take 
the  sword  shall  perish  with  the  sword.  Thinkest  thou  that 
I  cannot  now  pray  to  my  Father,  and  he  shall  presently  give 
me  more  than  twelve  legions  of  angels.  But  how  then  snail 
the  scriptures  be  fulfilled  that  thus  it  must  be.  In  that  same 
hour  Jesus  said  to  the  multitudes,  are  ye  come  out  as  against 
a  thief,  with  swords  and  with  staves  for  to  take  me  ?  I  sat 
daily  with  you  teaching  in  the  temple,  and  ye  laid  no  hold 
on  me.  But  all  this  was  done  that  the  scriptures  of  the  pro- 
phets might  be  fulfilled." 

This  loose  and  general  manner  of  speaking,  admits  neither 
of  detection  nor  of  proof.  Here  is  no  quotation  given,  nor 
the  name  of  any  Bible  author  mentioned,  to  which  reference 
can  be  had. 

There  are,  however,  some  high  improbabilities  against  the 
truth  of  the  account. 

First — It  is  not  probable  that  the  Jews,  who  were  then  a 
conquered  people,  and  under  subjection  to  the  Romans, 
should  be  permitted  to  wear  swords. 

Secondly — If  Peter  had  attacked  the  servant  of  the  high 
priest  and  cut  off  his  ear,  he  would  have  been  immediately 
taken  up  by  the  guard  that  took  up  his  master  and  sent  to 
prison  with  him. 

Thirdly — What  sort  of  disciples  and  preaching  apostles 
nrist  those  of  Christ  have  been  that  wore  swords  ? 

.  Fourthly — This  scene  is  represented  to  have  taken  place 
the  same  evening  of  what  is  called  the  Lord's  supper,  which 
makes,  according  to  the  ceremony  of  it,  the  inconsistency  of 
wearing  swords  the  greater. 

I  pass  on  to  the  eleventh  passage  called  a  prophecy  of 
Jesus  Christ. 

Matthew,  chap,  xxvii.  ver.  3.  "  Then  Judas  which  had 
betrayed  him,  when  lie  saw  that  he  was  condemned,  repented 

8* 


178  EXAMINATION  OF 

himself,  and  brought  again  the  thirty  pieces  of  silver  to  the 
chief  priests  and  elders,  saying,  I  have  sinned  in  that  1  have 
betrayed  the  innocent  blood.  And  they  said,  what  is  that 
to  us,  see  thou  to  that.  And  he  cast  down  the  thirty  pieces 
of  silver,  and  departed,  and  went  and  hanged  himself — And 
the  chief  priests  took  the  silver  pieces  and  said,  it  is  not 
lawful  to  put  them  into  the  treasury,  because  it  is  the  price 
of  blood — And  they  took  counsel  and  bought  with  them 
the  potter's  field  to  bury  strangers  in — Wherefore  that  field 
is  called  the  field  of  blood  unto  this  day.  Then  was  fulfilled 
that  which  was  spoken  by  Jeremiah  the  prophet,  saying, 
And  they  took  the  thirty  pieces  of  silver,  the  price  of  him 
that  was  valued,  whom  they  of  the  children  of  Israel  did 
value,  and  gave  them  to  the  potter's  field,  as  the  Lord 
appointed  me." 

This  is  a  most  barefaced  piece  of  imposition.  The  pas- 
sage in  Jeremiah  which  speaks  of  the  purchase  of  a  field, 
has  no  more  to  do  with  the  case  to  which  Matthew  applies 
it,  than  it  has  to  do  with  the  purchase  of  lands  in  America. 
I  will  recite  the  whole  passage : 

Jeremiah,  chap,  xxxii.  v.  6.  "  And  Jeremiah  said,  the 
word  of  the  Lord  came  unto  me,  saying — Behold  Hanamid, 
the  son  of  Shallum  thine  uncle,  shall  come  unto  thee,  say- 
ing, buy  thee  my  field  that  is  in  Anathoth,  for  the  right  of 
redemption  is  thine  to  buy  it — So  Hanamiel  mine  uncle's 
son  came  to  me  in  .the  court  of  the  prison,  according  to  the 
word  of  the  Lord,  and  said  unto  me,  buy  my  field  I  pray 
thee  that  is  in  Anathoth,  which  is  in  the  country  of  Benja- 
min, for  the  right  of  inheritance  is  thine,  and  the  redemp- 
tion is  thine ;  buy  it  for  thyself.  Then  I  knew  this  was  the 
word  of  the  Lord — And  I  bought  the  field  of  Hanamiel 
mine  uncle's  son,  that  was  in  Anathoth,  and  weighed  him  the 
money,  even  seventeen  shekels  of  silver — and  I  subscribed 
the  evidence  and  sealed  it,  and  took  witnesses  and  weighed 
him  the  money  in  balances.  So  I  took  the  evidence  of  the 
purchase,  both  that  which  was  sealed  according  to  the  law 
and  custom,  and  that  which  was  open — and  I  gave  the  evi- 
dence of  the  purchase  unto  Baruch,  the  son  of  Neriah,  the 
son  of  Maasaeiath,  in  the  sight  of  Hanamiel  mine  uncle's 
son,  and  in  the  presence  of  the  witnesses  that  subscribed, 
before  all  the  Jews  that  sat  in  the  court  of  the  prison — and 
[  charged  Baruch  before  them,  saying,  Thus  saith  the  Lord 
of  hosts,  the  God  of  Israel,  Take  these  evidences,  this  evi- 
dence of  the  purchase  both  which  is  sealed,  and  this  evidence 


THE   PEOPHECIE8.  179 

which  is  open,  and  put  them  in  an  earthen  vessel,  that  they 
may  continue  many  days — for  thus  saith  the  Lord  of  hosts, 
the  God  of  Israel,  nouses,  and  fields,  and  vineyards,  shall  be 
possessed  again  in  this  land." 

I  forbear  making  any  remark  on  this  abominable  imposi- 
tion of  Matthew.  The  thing  glaringly  speaks  for  itself;  It 
is  priests  and  commentators  that  I  rather  ought  to  censure, 
for  having  preached  falsehood  so  long,  and  kept  people  in 
darkness  with  respect  to  those  impositions.  I  am  not  con- 
tending with  these  men  upon  points  of  doctrine,  for  I  know 
that  sophistry  has  always  a  city  of  refuge.  I  am  speaking 
of  facts :  for  wherever  the  thing  called  a  fact  is  a  falsehood, 
the  faith  founded  upon  it  is  delusion,  and  the  doctrine  raised 
upon  it  not  true.  Ah,  reader,  put  thy  trust  in  thy  Creator, 
and  thou  wilt  be  safe !  but  if  thou  trustest  to  the  book  called 
the  scriptures,  thou  trustest  to  the  rotten  staff  of  fable  and 
falsehood.  But  I  return  to  my  subject. 

There  is  among  the  whims  and  reveries  of  Zechariah,  men- 
tion made  of  thirty  pieces  of  silver  given  to  a  potter.  They 
can  hardly  have  been  so  stupid  as  to  mistake  a  potter 
for  a  field:  and  if  they  had,  the  passage  in  Zechariah 
has  no  more  to  do  with  Jesus,  Judas,  and  Sie  field  to  bury 
strangers  in,  than  that  already  quoted.  I  will  recite  the 
passage. 

Zechariah,  chap.  xi.  ver.  7.  "  And  I  will  feed  the  flock 
of  slaughter,  even  you,  O  poor  of  the  flock ;  and  I  took  unto 
me  two  staves ;  the  one  I  called  Beauty,  and  the  other  I 
called  Bands,  and  I  fed  the  flock — Three  shepherds  also,  I 
cut  off  in  one  month ;  and  my  soul  loathed  them,  and  their 
soul  also  abhorred  me. — Then  said  I,  I  will  not  feed  you  ; 
that  which  dieth,  let  it  die ;  and  that  which  is  to  be  cut  off, 
let  it  be  cut  off ;  and  let  the  rest  eat  every  one  the  flesh  of 
another. — And  I  took  my  staff,  even  Beauty,  and  cut  it 
asunder,  that  I  might  break  my  covenant  which  I  had  made 
with  all  the  people. — And  it  was  broken  in  that  day ;  and 
so  the  poor  01  the  flock  who  waited  upon  me,  knew  that  it 
was  the  word  of  the  Lord. 

"  And  I  said  unto  them,  if  ye  think  good  give  me  my 
price,  and  if  not,  forbear.  So  they  weighed  for  my  price 
thirty  pieces  of  silver.  And  the  Lord  said  unto  me,  cast  it 
unto  the  potter,  a  goodly  price  that  I  was  prized  at  of  them ; 
and  I  took  the  thirty  pieces  of  silver  and  cast  them  to  the 
potter  in  the  house  of  the  Lord. 

"When  I  cut  asunder  mine   other  staff,  even  Band»t 


180  EXAMINATION  OF 

that  I  might  break  the  brotherhood  between  Judah  and 
Israel."* 

There  is  no  making  either  head  or  tail  of  this  incoherent 
gibberish.  His  two  staves,  one  called  Beauty  and  the  other 
jBands,  is  so  much  like  a  fairy  tale,  that  I  doubt  if  it  had 
any  other  origin. — There  is,  however,  no  part  that  has  the 
least  relation  to  the  case  stated  in  Matthew ;  on  the  contrary, 
it  is  the  reverse  of  it.  Here  the  thirty  pieces  of  silver,  what- 
ever it  was  for,  is  called  a  goodly  price,  it  was  as  much  as 
the  thing  was  worth,  and  according  to  the  language  of  the 
day,  was  approved  of  by  the  Lord,  and  the  money  given  to 
the  potter  in  the  house  of  the  Lord.  In  the  case  of  Jesus 
and  Judas,  as  stated  in  Matthew,  the  thirty  pieces  of  silver 
were  the  price  of  blood ;  the  transaction  was  condemned  by 
the  Lord,  and  the  money  when  refunded,  was  refused  admit- 
tance into  the  Treasury.  Every  thing  in  the  two  cases  is  the 
reverse  of  each  other. 

Besides  this,  a  very  different  and  direct  contrary  account 
to  that  of  Matthew,  is  given  of  the  affair  of  Judas,  in  the 
book  called  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles',  according  to  that 
book,  the  case  is,  that  so  far  from  Judas  repenting  and  return- 

*  Whiston,  in  his  Essay  on  the  Old  Testament,  says,  that  the  passage  of 
Zechariah  of  which  I  have  spoken,  was  in  the  copies  of  the  Bible  of  the  first 
century,  in  the  book  of  Jeremiah,  from  whence,  says  he,  it  was  taken  and  in- 
serted without  coherence,  in  that  of  Zechariah — well,  let  it  be  so,  it  does  not 
make  the  case  a  whit  the  better  for  the  New  Testament;  but  it  makes  the 
case  a  great  deal  the  worse  for  the  old.  Because  it  shows  as  I  have  mentioned 
respecting  some  passages  in  a  book  ascribed  to  Isaiah,  that  the  works  of  different 
authors  have  been  so  mixed  and  confounded  together,  they  cannot  now  be  dis- 
criminated, except  where  they  are  historical,  chronological,  or  biographical,  as 
in  the  interpolation  in  Isaiah.  It  is  the  name  of  Cyrus  inserted  where  it  could 
not  be  inserted,  as  he  was  not  in  existence  till  one  hundred  and  fifty  years  after 
the  time  of  Isaiah,  that  detects  the  interpolation  and  the  blunder  with  it. 

Whiston  was  a  man  of  great  literary  learning,  and  what  is  of  much  higher 
degree,  of  deep  scientific  learning.  He  was  one  of  the  best  and  most  celebrat- 
ed mathematicians  of  his  time,  for  which  he  was  made  professor  of  mathema- 
tics of  the  University  of  Cambridge.  He  wrote  so  much  in  defence  of  the  Old 
Testament,  and  of  what  he  calls  prophecies  of  Jesus  Christ,  that  at  last  he 
began  to  suspect  the  truth  of  the  Scriptures,  and  wrote  against  them ;  for  it 
is  only  those  who  examine  them,  that  see  the  imposition.  Those  who  believe 
them  most,  are  those  who  know  least  about  them. 

Whiston,  after  writing  so  much  in  defence  of  the  Scriptures,  was  at  last  pro- 
secuted for  writing  against  them.  It  was  this  that  gave  occasion  to  Swift,  in 
his  ludicrous  epigram  on  Ditton  and  Whiston,  each  of  which  set  up  to  find 
out  the  longitude,  to  call  the  one  good  master  Ditton  and  the  other  wicked  Will 
Whiston.  But  as  Swift  was  a  great  associate  with  the  Freethinkers  of  those 
days,  such  as  Bolingbroke,  Pope,  and  others,  who  did  not  believe  the  book 
called  the  scriptures,  there  is  no  certainty  whether  he  wittily  called  him  wicked 
for  defending  the  scriptures,  or  for  writing  againot  ttsin.  The  known  char« 
acter  of  Swift  decides  for  the  former. 


THE   PKOPHECIES.  181 

ing  the  money,  and  the  high  priest  buying  a  field  with  it  to 
bury  strangers  in,  Judas  kept  the  money  and  bought  a  field 
•with  it  for  nimself ;  and  instead  of  hanging  himself,  as  Mat- 
thew says,  he  fell  headlong  and  burst  asunder — some  com- 
mentators endeavour  to  get  over  one  part  of  the  contradiction 
by  ridiculously  supposing  that  Judas  hanged  himself  first 
and  the  rope  broke. 

Acts,  chap.  i.  ver.  16.  "  Men  and  brethren,  this  scripture 
must  needs  have  been  fulfilled  which  the  Holy  Ghost  by  the 
mouth  of  David  spake  before  concerning  Judas,  which  was 
a  guide  to  them  that  took  Jesus.  (David  says  not  a  word 
about  Judas,)  ver.  IT,  for  he  (Judas)  was  numbered  among 
us  and  obtained  part  of  our  ministry." 

Yer.  18.  "  Now  this  man  purchased  a  field  with  tJie  re- 
ward of  iniquity,  and  falling  headlong,  he  burst  asunder  in 
the  midst,  and  his  bowels  gushed  out."  Is  it  not  a  species 
of  blasphemy  to  call  the  New  Testament  revealed  religion^ 
when  we  see  in  it  such  contradictions  and  absurdities. 

I  pass  on  to  the  twelfth  passage  called  a  prophecy  of  Jesus 
Christ. 

Matthew,  chap,  xxvii.  ver.  35.  "  And  they  crucified  him, 
and  parted  his  garments,  casting  lots  ;  that  it  might  be  ful- 
filled which  was  spoken  by  the  prophet,  They  parted  my 
garments  among  them,  and  upon  my  vesture  did  they  cast 
lots.'''1  This  expression  is  in  the  22d  Psalm,  ver.  18.  The 
writer  of  that  Psalm  (whoever  he  was,  for  the  Psalms  are  a 
collection  and  not  the  work  of  one  man)  is  speaking  of  himself 
and  his  own  case,  and  not  that  of  another.  He  begins  this 
Psalm  with  the  words  wich  the  New  Testament  writers  as- 
cribed to  Jesus  Christ.  "  My  God,  my  God,  why  hast  thou 
forsaken  me" — words  which  might  be  uttered  by  a  complain- 
ing man  without  any  great  impropriety,  but  very  improperly 
from  the  mouth  of  a  reputed  God. 

The  picture  which  the  writer  draws  of  his  own  situation 
in  this  JPsalm,  is  gloomy  enough.  He  is  not  prophecying, 
but  complaining  of  his  own  hard  case.  He  represents  him- 
self as  surrounded  by  enemies,  and  beset  bv  persecutions  of 
every  kind ;  and  by  way  of  showing  the  inveteracy  of  his 
persecutors,  he  says,  at  the  18th  verse,  "  They  parted  my 
garments  among  them,  and  cast  lots  upon  my  vesture"  The 
expression  is  in  the  present  tense  ;  and  is  the  same  as  to  say, 
they  pursue  me  even  to  the  clothes  upon  my  back,  and  die- 

Sute  how  they  shall  divide  them  ;  besides,  the  word  vextur* 
o«s  not  always  mean  clothing  of  any  kin<l>  but  property,  or 


182  EXAMINATION   OF 

rathei  the  admitting  a  man  to,  or  investing  him  -w.th  pro 
perty ;  and  as  it  is  used  in  this  Psalm  distinct  from  the  word 
garment,  it  appears  to  be  used  in  this  sense.  But  Jesus  had 
no  property ;  for  they  make  him  say  of  himself,  "  The  foxes 
have  holes  and  the  birds  of  the  air  have  nests,  but  the  Son  of 
Man  hath  not  where  to  lay  his  head" 

But  be  this  as  it  may,  if  we  permit  ourselves  to  suppose 
the  Almighty  would  condescend  to  tell,  by  what  is  called 
the  spirit  of  prophecy,  what  could  come  to  pass  in  some  fu- 
ture age  of  the  world,  it  is  an  injury  to  our  own  faculties, 
and  to  our  ideas  of  his  greatness,  to  imagine  that  it  would 
be  about  an  old  coat,  or  an  old  pair  of  breeches,  or  about 
any  thing  which  the  common  accidents  of  life,  or  the  quarrels 
that  attend  it,  exhibit  every  day. 

That  which  is  in  the  power  of  man  to  do,  or  in  his  will 
not  to  do,  is  not  a  subject  for  prophecy,  even  if  there  were 
such  a  thing,  because  it  cannot  carry  with  it  any  evidence 
of  divine  power,  or  divine  interposition  :  The  ways  of  God 
are  not  the  ways  of  men.  That  which  an  almighty  power 
performs,  or  wills,  is  not  within  the  circle  of  human  power 
to  do,  or  to  control.  But  any  executioner  and  his  assistants 
might  quarrel  about  dividing  the  garments  of  a  sufferer,  or 
divide  them  without  quarelling,  and  by  that  means  fulfil  the 
thing  called  a  prophecy  or  set  it  aside. 

In  the  passage  before  examined,  I  have  exposed  the  false- 
hood of  them.  In  this  1  exhibit  its  degrading  meanness,  as 
an  insult  to  the  Creator  and  an  injury  to  human  reason. 

Here  end  the  passages  called  prophecies  by  Matthew. 

Matthew  concludes  his  book  by  saying,  that  when  Christ 
expired  on  the  cross,  the  rocks  rent,  the  graves  opened,  and 
the  bodies  of  many  of  the  saints  arose  ;  and  Mark  says,  there 
was  darkness  over  the  land  from  the  sixth  hour  until  the 
ninth.  They  produce  no  prophecy  for  this ;  but  had  these 
things  been  facts,  they  would  have  been  a  proper  subject  for 
prophecy,  because  none  but  an  almighty  power  could  have 
inspired  a  foreknowledge  of  them,  and  afterwards  fulfilled 
them.  Since  then  there  is  no  such  prophecy,  but  a  pretended 
prophecy  of  an  old  coat,  the  proper  deduction  is,  there  were 
no  such  things,  and  that  the  book  of  Matthew  is  fable  and 
falsehood. 

I  pass  on  to  the  book  called  the  Gospel  according  to  St. 
Mark. 


THE   PEOPHBCTE8.  183 


THE  BOOK  OF  MAEK. 

THERE  are  but  few  passages  in  Mark  called  prophecies ; 
and  but  few  in  Luke  and  John..  Such  as  there  are  I  shall 
examine,  and  also  such  other  passages  as  interfere  with  those 
cited  by  Matthew. 

Mark  begins  his  book  by  a  passage  which  he  puts  in  the 
shape  of  a  prophecy.  Mark,  chap.  1,  verse  1. — "The  be- 
ginning of  me  Uospel  of  Jesus  Christ,  the  Son  of  God — As 
it  is  written  in  the  prophets,  Behold  I  send  my  messenger 
before  thy  face,  which  shall  prepare  the  way  before  thee" 
Malachi,  cnap.  iii.  verse  1.  The  passage  in  the  original  is 
in  the  first  person.  Mark  makes  this  passage  to  be  a  pro- 
phecy of  John  the  Baptist,  said  by  the  Church  to  be  a  fore- 
runner of  Jesus  Christ.  But  if  we  attend  to  the  verses  that 
follow  this  expression,  as  it  stands  in  Malachi,  and  to  the 
first  and  fifth  verses  of  the  next  chapter,  we  shall  see  that 
this  application  of  it  is  erroneous  and  false. 

Malachi  having  said,  at  the  first  verse,  "  Behold  I  will 
send  my  messenger,  and  he  shall  prepare  the  way  before 
me,"  says,  at  the  second  verse,  "  But  who  may  abide  the  day 
of  his  coming  ?  and  who  shall  stand  when  he  appeareth  ?  for 
he  is  like  a  refiner's  fire,  and  like  fuller's  soap. 

This  description  can  have  no  reference  to  the  birth  of 
Jesus  Christ,  and  consequently  none  to  John  the  Baptist. 
It  is  a  scene  of  fear  and  terror  that  is  here  described,  and 
the  birth  of  Christ  is  always  spoken  of  as  a  time  of  joy  and 
glad  tidings. 

Malachi,  continuing  to  speak  on  the  same  subject,  ex- 
plains in  the  next  chapter  what  the  scene  is  of  which  he 
speaks  in  the  verses  above  quoted,  and  whom  the  person  is 
whom  he  calls  the  messenger. 

"  Behold,"  says  he,  chap.  iv.  verse  1,  "  the  day  cometh 
that  shall  burn  like  an  oven,  and  all  the  proud,  yea,  and  all 
that  do  wickedly,  shall  be  stubble ;  and  the  day  cometh  that 
shall  burn  them  up,  said  the  Lord  of  hosts,  that  it  shall  leave 
them  neither  root  nor  branch." 

Verse  5.  "  Behold  I  will  send  you  Elijah  the  prophet  be- 
fore the  coming  of  the  great  and  dreadful  day  of  the  Lord." 

By  what  right,  or  by  what  imposition  or  ignorance  Mark 
has  made  Elijah  into  John  the  Baptist,  and  Malachi's  de- 
ecriptiop  of  the  day  of  judgment  into  the  birth  day  of  Christ. 
I  leave  to  Die  Bishop  to  settle. 


184-  EXAMINATION   OP 

Mark,  in  the  second  and  third  verses  of  his  first  chapter,, 
confounds  two  passages  together,  taken  from  different  bookg 
of  the  Old  Testament.  The  second  verse,  "  Behold  I  send 
my  messenger  before  thy  face,  which  shall  prepare  the  way 
before  me,  is  taken,  as  I  have  said  before,  from  Malachi. 
The  third  verse,  which  says,  "  The  voice  of  one  crying  in  the 
wilderness,  prepare  ye  the  way  of  the  Lord,  make  his  path 
straight,"  is  not  in  Malachi,  but  in  Isaiah,  chap,  xi,  verse  3. 
Whiston  says,  that  both  these  verses  were  originally  in 
Isaiah.  If  so,  it  is  another  instance  of  the  disordered  state 
of  the  Bible,  and  corroborates  what  I  have  said  with  respect 
to  the  name  and  description  of  Cyrus  being  in  the  book  of 
Isaiah,  to  which  it  cannot  chronologically  belong. 

The  words  in  Isaiah,  chap,  xl,  verse  3.  "  The  voice  of 
him  that  eryeth  in  the  wilderness,  prepare  ye  the  way  of  the 
Lord,  make  his  path  straight"  are  in  the  present  tense,  and 
consequently  not  predictive.  It  is  one  of  those  rhetorical 
figures  which  the  Old  Testament  authors  frequently  used. 
That  it  is  merely  rhetorical  and  metaphorical,  may  be  seen 
at  the  6th  verse.  "  And  the  voice  said,  cry ;  and  he  said 
what  shall  I  cry  ?  All  flesh  is  grass"  This  is  evidently 
nothing  but  a  figure ;  for  flesh  is  not  grass  otherwise  than  as 
a  figure  or  metaphor,  where  one  thing  is  put  for  another. 
Besides  which,  the  whole  passage  is  too  general  and  decla- 
matory to  be  applied  exclusively  to  any  particular  person  or 
purpose. 

I  pass  on  to  the  eleventh  chapter. 

In  this  chapter,  Mark  speaks  of  Christ  riding  into  Jerusa- 
lem upon  a  colt,  but  he  does  not  make  it  the  accomplishment 
of  a  prophecy,  as  Matthew  has  done ;  for  he  says  nothing 
about  a  prophecy.  Instead  of  which  he  goes  on  the  other 
tack,  and  in  order  to  add  new  honors  to  the  ass,  he  makes  it 
to  be  a  miracle ;  for  he  says,  ver.  2,  it  was  "  a  colt  whereon 
never  man  sat  /"  signifying  thereby,  that  as  the  ass  had  not 
been  broken,  he  consequently  was  inspired  into  good  man- 
ners, for  we  do  not  hear  that  he  kicked  Jesus  Christ  off. 
There  is  not  a  word  about  his  kicking  in  all  the  four  Evan- 
gelists. 

I  pass  on  from  these  feats  of  horsemanship,  performed 
upon  a  jack-ass,  to  the  15th  chapter. 

At  the  24th  verse  of  this  chapter,  Mark  speaks  of  parting 
Christ's  garments  and  casting  lots  upon  them,  but  he  applies 
no  prophecy  to  it  as  Matthew  does.  He  rather  speaks  of  it  a& 
a  thing  then  in  practice  with  executioners,  as  it  is  at  £his  da f. 


THE   PKOPHECIES  185- 

At  the  28th  verse  of  the  same  chapter,  Mark  speaks  of 
Christ  being  crucified  between  two  tnieves ;  that,  says  he, 
"  the  scriptures  might  be  fulfilled  which  saith,  a/nd  he,  was 
numbered  with  the  transgressors."  The  same  thing  might 
be  said  of  the  thieves. 

This  expression  is  in  Isaiah,  chap.  liii.  ver.  12 — Grotius 
applies  it  to  Jeremiah.  But  the  case  has  happened  so  often 
in  the  world,  where  innocent  men  have  been  numbered  with 
transgressors,  and  is  still  continually  happening,  that  it  is 
absurdity  to  call  it  a  prophecy  of  any  particular  person. 
All  those  whom  the  cnurch  call  martyrs  were  numbered 
with  transgressors.  All  the  honest  patriots  who  fell  upon 
the  scaffold  in  France,  in  the  time  of  Robespierre,  were 
numbered  with  transgressors ;  and  if  himself  had  not  fallen, 
the  same  case,  according  to  a  note  in  his  own  handwriting, 
had  befallen  me ;  yet  I  suppose  the  bishop  will  not  allow 
that  Isaiah  was  prophesying  of  Thomas  Paine. 

These  are  all  the  passages  in  Mark  which  have  any  refer- 
ence to  prophecies. 

Mark  concludes  his  book  by  making  Jesus  say  to  his  dis- 
ciples, chap.  xvi.  ver.  15,  "  Go  ye  into  all  the  world  and 
preach  the  gospel  to  every  creature ;  he  that  believeth  and 
is  baptized  shall  be  saved,  but  he  that  believeth  not  shall  be 
damned,  (fine  Popish  stuff  this,)  and  these  signs  shall  follow 
them  that  believe  ;  in  my  name  they  shall  cast  out  devils ; 
they  shall  speak  with  new  tongues  ;  they  shall  take  up  seiv 
pents,  and  if  they  drink  any  deadly  thing  it  shall  not  hurt 
them ;  they  shall  lay  hands  on  the  sick,  and  they  shall 
recover." 

Now,  the  bishop,  in  order  to  know  if  he  has  all  this  sav- 
ing and  wonder-working  faith,  should  try  those  things  upon 
himself.  ,  He  should  taKe  a  good  dose  of  arsenic,  and  if  he 
please,  I  will  send  him  a  rattle-snake  from  America  !  As 
for  myself,  as  I  believe  in  God  and  not  at  all  in  Jesus  Christ, 
nor  in  the  books  called  the  scriptures,  the  experiment  does 
not  concern  me. 

I  pass  on  to  the  book  of  Luke. 

There  are  no  passages  in  Luke  called  prophecies,  except- 
ing those  which  relate  to  the  passages  I  have  already  ex- 
amined. 

Luke  speaks  of  Mary  being  espoused  to  Joseph,  bnt  he 
makes  no  references  to  the  passage  in  Isaiah,  as  Matthew 
docs.  He  speaks  also  of  Jesus  riding  into  Jerusalem  upon 
a  colt,  tut  he  says  nothing  about  a  prophecy.  He  speaks 


186  EXAMINATION   OF 

of  John  the  Baptist,  and  refers  to  the  passage  in  Isaiah  yt 
which  I  have  already  spoken. 

At  the  13th  chapter,  verse  31,  he  says,  "  The  same  day 
there  came  certain  of  the  Pharisees,  saying  unto  him  (Jesus) 
get  thee  out  and  depart  hence,  for  Herod  will  kill  thee — 
and  he  said  unto  them,  go  ye  and  tell  that  fox,  behold  I  cast 
out  devils  and  I  do  cures  to-day  and  to-morrow,  and  the 
third  day  I  shall  be  perfected." 

Matthew  makes  Herod  to  die  whilst  Christ  was  a  child  in 
Egypt,  and  makes  Joseph  to  return  with  the  child  on  the 
news  of  Herod's  death,  who  had  sought  to  kill  him.  Luke 
makes  Herod  to  be  living,  and  to  seek  the  life  of  Jesus  after 
Jesus  was  thirty  years  of  age :  for  he  says,  chap.  iii.  v.  23, 
"  And  Jesus  began  to-be  about  thirty  years  of  age,  being, 
as  was  supposed,  the  son  of  Joseph." 

The  obscurity  in  which  the  historical  part  of  the  New 
Testament  is  involved  with  respect  to  Herod,  may  afford  to 
priests  and  commentors  a  plea,  which  to  some  may  appear 
plausible,  but  to  none  satisfactory,  that  the  Herod  of  whicli 
Matthew  speaks,  and  the  Herod  of  which  Luke  speaks,  were 
different  persons.  Matthew  calls  Herod  a  kinoj ;  and  Luke, 
chap.  iii.  v.  1,  calls  Herod  Tetrarch  (that  is,  Governor)  of 
Galilee.  But  there  could  be  no  such  person  as  a  king 
Herod,  because  the  Jews  and  their  country  were  then  under 
the  dominion  of  the  Roman  Emperors  who  governed  them 
by  Tetrarchs  or  Governors. 

Luke,  chap.  ii.  makes  Jesus  to  be  born  when  Cyrenius 
was  Governor  of  Syria,  to  which  government  Judea  was 
annexed  ;  and  according  to  this,  Jesus  was  not  born  in  the 
time  of  Herod.  Luke  says  nothing  about  Herod  seeking 
'the  life  of  Jesus  when  he  was  born  ;  nor  of  his  destroying 
the  children  under  two  years  old^  nor  of  Joseph  fleeing  with 
Jesus  into  Egypt :  nor  of  his  returning  from  thence.  On 
the  contrary,  the  book  of  Luke  speaks  as  if  the  person  it 
calls  Christ  had  never  been  out  of  Judea,  and  that  Herod 
sought  his  life  after  he  commenced  preaching,  as  is  before 
stated.  I  have  already  shown  that  Luke,  in  the  book  called 
the  Acts  of  the  Apostles,  (which  commentators  ascribe  to 
Luke,)  contradicts  the  account  in  Matthew,  with  respect  to 
Judas  and  the  thirty  pieces  of  silver.  Matthew  says,  that 
Judas  returned  the  money,  and  that  the  high  priests  bought 
with  it  a  field  to  bury  strangers  in.  Luke  says,  that  Judas 
kept  the  money,  and  bought  a  field  with  it  for  himself. 

As  it  is  impossible  the  wisdom  of  God  should  err,  so  it  is 


THE   PROPHECIES.  187 

Impossible  those  books  should  have  been  written  by  divine 
inspiration.  Our  belief  in  God,  and  his  unerring  wisdom, 
forbids  us  to  believe  it.  As  for  myself,  I  feel  religiously 
happy  in  the  total  disbelief  of  it. 

There  are  no  other  passages  called  prophecies  in  Luke 
than  those  I  have  spoken  of.  I  pass  on  to  the  book  of 
John. 


THE  BOOK  OF  JOHN. 

JOHN,  like  Mark  and  Luke,  is  not  much  of  a  prophecy- 
monger.  He  speaks  of  the  ass,  and  the  casting  lots  for  Jesus' 
clothes,  and  some  other  trifles,  of  which  ihave  already 
spoken. 

John  makes  Jesus  to  say,  chap.  v.  ver.  46,  "  For  had  ye 
believed  Moses,  ye  would  have  believed  me,  for  he  wrote  of 
me."  The  book  of  the  Acts,  in  speaking  of  Jesus,  says,  chap, 
iii.  ver.  22,  "  For  Moses  truly  said  unto  the  fathers,  a  prophet 
shall  the  Lord  your  God  raise  up  unto  you,  of  your  brethren, 
like  unto  me,  him  shall  ye  hear  in  all  things  whatsoever  he 
shalt  say  unto  you." 

This  passage  is  in  Deuteronomy,  chap,  xviii.  ver.  15.  They 
apply  it  as  a  prophecy  of  Jesus.  What  impositions !  The 
person  spoken  of  in  Deuteronomy,  and  also  in  Numbers, 
where  the  same  person  is  spoken  of,  is  Joshua^  the  minister 
of  Moses,  and  his  immediate  successor,  and  just  such  another 
Robespierrean  character  as  Moses  is  represented  to  have  been. 
The  case,  as  related  in  those  books,  is  as  follows  : — 

Moses  was  grown  old  and  near  to  his  end,  and  in  order  to 
prevent  confusion  after  his  death,  for  the  Israelites  had  no 
settled  system  of  government ;  it  was  thought  best  to  nomi- 
nate a  successor  to  Moses  while  he  was  yet  living.  This  was 
done,  as  we  are  told,  in  the  following  manner : 

Numbers,  chap,  xxvii.  ver.  12.  "  And  the  Lord  said  unto 
Moses,  get  thee  up  into  this  mount  Abarim,  and  see  the 
land  which  I  have  given  unto  the  children  of  Israel — and 
when  thou  hast  seen  it,  thou  also  shalt  be  gathered  unto  thy 
people,  as  Aaron  thy  brother  is  gathered,  ver.  15.  And 
Moses  spake  unto  the  Lord,  saying,  Let  the  Lord,  the  God  of 
the  spirits  of  all  flesh,  set  a  man  over  the  congregation- 
TV  hich  may  go  out  before  them,  and  which  may  go  in  before 


188  EXAMINATION   OF 

them,  and  which  may  lead  them  out,  and  which  may  bring 
them  in,  that  the  congregation  of  the  Lord  be  not  as  sheep 
that  have  no  shepherd — And  the  Lord  said  unto  Moses,  take 
thee  Joshua^  the  son  of  Nun,  a  man  in  whom  is  the  spirit, 
and  lay  thine  hand  upon  him — and  set  him  before  Eleazar, 
the  priest,  and  before  all  the  congregation,  and  give  him  a 
charge  in  their  sight — and  thou  shalt  put  some  of  thine 
honour  upon  him,  that  all  the  congregation  of  the  children 
of  Israel  may  be  obedient — ver.  22,  and  Moses  did  as  the 
Lord  commanded,  and  he  took  Joshua,  and  set  him  before 
Eleazar  the  priest,  and  before  all  the  congregation ;  and  he 
laid  hands  upon  him,  and  gave  him  charge  as  the  Lord 
commanded  by  the  hand  of  Moses." 

I  have  nothing  to  do,  in  this  place,  with  the  truth,  or  the 
conjuration  here  practised,  of  raising  up  a  successor  to  Moses 
like  unto  himself.  The  passage  sufficiently  proves  it  is 
Joshua,  and  that  it  is  an  imposition  in  John  to  make  the 
case  into  a  prophecy  of  Jesus.  But  the  prophecy-mongers 
were  so  inspired  with  falsehood,  that  they  never  speak  truth.* 

*  Newton,  Bishop  of  Bristol  in  England,  published  a  work  in  three  volumes,. 
entitled,  "  Dissertations  on  the  Prophecies."  The  work  is  tediously  written 
and  tiresome  to  read.  He  strains  hard  to  make  every  passage  into  a  prophecy 
that  suits  his  purpose. — Among  others,  he  makes  this  expression  of  Moses, 
"  the  Lord  shall  raise  thee  up  a  prophet  like  unto  me,"  into  a  prophecy  of 
Christ,  who  was  not  born,  according  to  the  Bible  chronologies,  till  fifteen 
hundred  and  fifty-two  years  after  the  time  of  Moses,  whereas  it  was  an  im- 
mediate successor  to  Moses,  who  was  then  near  his  end,  that  is  spoken  of  in 
the  passage  above  quoted. 

This  Bishop,  the  better  to  impose  this  passage  on  the  world  as  a  prophecy 
of  Christ,  has  entirely  omitted  the  account  hi  the  book  of  Numbers  which  I 
have  given  at  length,  word  for  word,  and  which  shows,  beyond  the  possibility 
of  a  doubt,  that  the  person  spoken  of  by  Moses,  is  Joshua,  and  no  other  per- 
son. 

Newton  is  but  a  superficial  writer.  He  takes  up  things  upon  hearsay,  and 
inserts  them  without  either  examination  or  reflection,  and  the  more  extraor- 
dinary and  incredible  they  are,  the  better  he  likes  them. 

in  speaking  of  the  walls  of  Babylon,  (volume  the  first,  page  263,)  he  makes 
a  quotation  from  a  traveller  of  the  name  of  2avernur,  whom  he  calls,  (by  way 
of  giving  credit  to  what  he  says,)  a  celebrated  traveller,  that  those  walls  were 
made  of  burnt  brick,  ten  feet  square  and  three  feet  thick. — If  Newton  had  only 
thought  of  calculating  the  weight  of  such  a  brick,  he  would  have  seen  the  im- 
possibility of  their  being  used  or  even  made.  A  brick  ten  feet  square,  and 
three  feet  thick,  contains  three  hundred  cubic  feet,  and  allowing  a  cubic  foot 
of  brick  to  be  only  one  hundred  pounds,  each  of  the  Bishop's  bricks  would 
weigh  thirty  thousand  pounds  ;  and  it  would  take  about  thirty  cart  loads  of 
clay  (oue  horse  carts)  to  make  one  brick. 

But  his  account  of  the  stones  used  in  the  building  of  Solomon's  temple, 
(volume  2d,  page  211,)  far  exceeds  his  bricks  of  ten  feet  square  in  the  walls  of 
Babylon  ;  these  are  but  brick-bats  compared  to  them. 

The  stones  (says  he)  employed  in  the  foundation,  were  in  magnitude  forty 
cubits,  that  is,  above  sixty  feet,  a  cubit,  says  he,  being  somewhat  more  than. 


THE   PROPHECIES.  189 

1  pass  to  the  last  passage  in  these  fables  of  the  Evangelists 
•called  a  prophecy  of  Jesus  Christ. 

John,  having  spoken  of  Jesus  expiring  on  the  cross  between 
two  thieves,  savs,  chap.  xix.  verse  32.  "  Then  came  the 
soldiers  and  brake  the  legs  of  the  first  (meaning  one  of  the 
thieves)  and  of  the  other  which  was  crucified  wim  him.  But 
when  tney  came  to  Jesus,  and  saw  that  he  was  dead  already, 
they  brake  not  his  legs — verse  36,  for  these  things  were  done 
that  the  Scriptures  should  be  fulfilled,  A  lone  of  Mm  shall 
not  be  broken" 

The  passage  here  referred  to  is  in  Exodus,  and  has  no  more 
to  do  with  Jesus  than  with  the  ass  he  rode  upon  to  Jerusa- 
lem ; — nor  yet  so  much,  if  a  roasted  jack-ass,  like  a  roasted 
he-goat,  might  be  eaten  at  a  Jewish  passover.  It  might  be 
some  consolation  to  an  ass  to  know  that  though  his  bones 
might  be  picked,  they  would  not  be  broken.  I  go  to  state 
the  case. 

The  book  of  Exodus,  in  instituting  the  Jewish  passover, 
in  which  they  were  to  eat  a  he-lamb  or  a  he-goat,  says,  chap. 

one  foot  and  a  half,  (a  cubit  is  one  foot  nine  inches,)  and  the  superstructure 
(says  this  Bishop)  was  worthy  of  such  foundations.  There  were  some  stones, 
says  he,  of  the  whitest  marble  forty-five  cubits  long,  five  cubits  high,  and  six 
cubits  broad.  These  are  the  dimensions  this  Bishop  has  given,  which  in 
measure  of  twelve  inches  to  a  foot,  is  78  feet  nine  inches  long,  10  feet  6  inchea 
broad,  and  8  feet  three  inches  thick,  and  contains  7,234  cubic  feet.  I  now  go 
to  demonstrate  the  imposition  of  this  Bishop. 

A  cubic  foot  of  water  weighs  sixty-two  pounds  and  a  half — The  specific 
gravity  of  marble  to  water  is  as  2  1-2  is  to  one.  The  weight,  therefore,  of  a 
cubic  foot  of  marble  is  656  pounds,  which,  multiplied  by  7,234,  the  number  of 
cubic  feet  in  one  of  these  stones,  makes  the  weight  of  it  to  be  1,128,604  pounds, 
which  is  503  tons.  Allowing  then  a  horse  to  draw  about  half  a  ton,  it  will 
require  a  thousand  horses  to  draw  one  such  stone  on  the  ground ;  how  then 
were  they  to  be  lifted  into  the  building  by  human  hands  ? 

The  Bishop  may  talk  of  faith  removing  mountains,  but  all  the  faith  of  all  the 
Bishops  that  ever  lived  could  not  remove  one  of  those  stones  and  their  bodily 
strength  given  in. 

The  Bishop  also  tells  of  great  guns  used  by  the  Turks  at  the  taking  of  Con- 
stantinople, one  of  which,  he  says,  was  drawn  by  seventy  yoke  of  oxen,  and 
by  two  thousand  men.  VoL  3d,  page  117. 

The  weight  of  a  cannon  that  carries  a  ball  of  43  pounds,  which  is  the  largest 
cannon  that  are  cast,  weighs  8000  pounds,  about  three  tons  and  a  half,  and 
may  be  drawn  by  three  yoke  of  oxen.  Any  body  may  now  calculate  what  the 
weight  of  the  Bishop's  great  gun  must  be,  that  required  seventy  yoke  of  oxen 
to  draw  it.  This  Bishop  beats  Gulliver. 

When  men  give  up  the  use  of  the  divine  gift  of  reason  in  writing  on  any 
subject,  be  it  religious  or  any  thing  else,  there  are  no  bounds  to  their  extrava- 
gance, no  limit  to  their  absurdities. 

The  three  volumes  which  this  Bishop  has  written  on  what  he  calls  the  pro- 
phecies, contain  above  1290  pages,  and  ha  says  in  vol.  3,  page  117,  "1  havi 
studied  Lrtoity."  This  is  as  marvellous  as  the  Bishop's  greu*  gun. 


190  EXAMINATION   OP 

xii.  verse  5.  "  Your,  lamb  shall  be  without  blemish,  a  male- 
of  the  first  year :  ye  shall  take  it  from  the  sheep  or  from  the 
goats" 

The  book,  after  stating  some  ceremonies  to  be  used  in 
killing  and  dressing  it,  (for  it  was  to  be  roasted,  not  boiled,) 
says,  ver.  43,  "  And  the  Lord  said  unto  Moses  and  Aaron, 
this  is  the  ordinance  of  the  passover :  there  shall  no  stranger 
eat  thereof;  but  every  man's  servant  that  is  bought  for 
money,  when  thou  hast  circumcised  him,  then  shall  he  eat 
thereof.  A  foreigner  shall  not  eat  thereof.  In  one  house 
shall  it  be  eaten ;  thou  shalt  not  carry  forth  ought  of  the 
flesh  thereof  abroad  out  of  the  house ;  neither  shalt  thou 
break  a  bone  thereof," 

We  here  see  that  the  case  as  it  stands  in  Exodus  is  a  cere- 
mony and  not  a  prophecy,  and  totally  unconnected  with 
Jesus  bones,  or  any  part  of  hhn. 

John,  having  thus  filled  up  the  measure  of  apostolic  fable, 
concludes  his  book  with  something  that  beats  all  fable ;  for 
he  says  at  the  last  verse,  "  And  there  are  also  many  other 
things  which  Jesus  did,  the  which  if  they  could  be  written 
every  one,  /  suppose  that  even  the  world  itself  could  not 
contain  the  books  that  should  be  written. 

This  is  what  in  vulgar  life  is  called  a  thumper  /  that  is, 
not  only  a  lie,  but  a  lie  beyond  the  line  of  possibility ; 
besides  which  it  is  an  absurdity,  for  if  they  should  be  writ- 
ten in  the  world,  the  world  would  contain  them. — Here  ends 
the  examination  of  the  passages  called  prophecies 


I  HAVE  now,  reader,  gone  through  and  examined  all  the 
passages  which  the  foar  books  of  Matthew,  Mark,  Luke,  and 
John,  quote  from  the  Old  Testament  and  call  them  prophe- 
cies of  Jesus  Christ.  "When  I  first  sat  down  to  this  examin- 
ation, I  expected  to  find  cause  for  some  censure,  but  little 
did  I  expect  to  find  them  so  utterly  destitute  of  truth,  and 
of  all  pretensions  to  it,  as  I  have  shown  them  to  be. 

The  practice  which  the  writers  of  those  books  employ  is 
not  more  false  than  it  is  absurd.  They  state  some  trifling 
case  of  the  person  they  call  Jesus  Christ,  and  then  cut  out  a 
sentence  from  some  passage  of  the  Old  Testament  and  call 
it  a  prophecy  of  that  case.  But  when  the  words  thus  cut 
out  are  restored  to  the  place  they  are  taken  from,-  and  read 
with  the  words  before  and  after  them,  they  give  the  lie  te 


THE   PBOPHECIB8. 


the  New  Testament.     A  short  instance  or  two  of  this  will 
suffice  for  the  whole. 

They  make  Joseph  to  dream  of  an  angel,  who  informs  him 
that  Herod  is  dead,  and  tells  him  to  come  with  the  child  out 
of  Egypt.  They  then  cut  out  a  sentence  from  the  book  of 
Hosea,  "  Out  of  Egypt  have  I  called  my  Son"  and  apply  it 
as  a  prophecy  in  that  case. 

The  words  "  And  called  my  Son  out  of  Egypt"  are  in  the 
Bible  ;  —  but  what  of  that  ?  They  are  only  part  of  a  passage, 
and  not  a  whole  passage,  and  stand  immediately  connected 
with  other  words,  which  show  they  refer  to  the  children  of 
Israel  coming  out  of  Egypt  in  the  time  of  Pharaoh,  and  to 
the  idolatry  they  committed  afterwards. 

Again,  tney  tell  us  that  when  the  soldiers  came  to  break 
the  legs  of  the  crucified  persons,  they  found  Jesus  was 
already  dead,  and,  therefore,  did  not  break  his.  They  then, 
with  some  alteration  of  the  original,  cut  out  a  sentence  from 
Exodus,  a  "  a  bone  of  him  shall  not  be  broken"  and  apply  it 
as  a  prophecy  of  that  case. 

The  words  "  Neither  shall  ye  break  a  bone  thereof"  (for 
they  have  altered  the  text,)  are  in  the  Bible  —  but  what  of 
that  ?  They  are,  as  in  the  former  case,  only  part  of  a  pas- 
sage, and  not  a  whole  passage,  and  when  read  with  the 
words  they  are  immediately  joined  to,  show  it  is  the  bones 
of  a  he-lamb  or  a  he-goat  of  which  the  passage  speaks. 

These  repeated  forgeries  and  falsifications  create  a  well 
founded  suspicion,  that  all  the  cases  spoken  of  concerning 
the  person  called  Jesus  Christ  are  made  cases,  on  purpose  to 
lug  in,  and  that  very  clumsily,  some  broken  sentences  from 
the  Old  Testament,  and  apply  them  as  prophecies  of  those 
cases  ;  and  that  so  far  from  his  being  the  Son  of  God,  he  did 
not  exist  even  as  a  man  —  that  he  is  merely  an  imaginary  or 
allegorical  character,  as  Apollo,  as  Hercules,  Jupiter,  ana  all 
the  deities  of  antiquity  were.  There  is  no  history  written 
at  the  time  Jesus  Cnrist  is  said  to  have  lived  that  speaks  of 
the  existence  of  such  a  person,  even  as  a  man. 

Did  we  find  in  any  other  book  pretending  to  give  a  sys- 
tem of  religion,  the  falsehoods,  falsifications,  contradictions, 
and  absurdities,  which  are  to  be  met  with  in  almost  every 
page  of  the  Old  and  New  Testament,  all  the  priests  of  the 
present  day  who  supposed  themselves  capable,  would 
triumphant!}  show  their  skill  in  criticism,  and  cry  it  down 
as  a  most  glaring  imposition.  But  since  the  books  in  ques- 
tion belong  to  tneir  own  trade  and  profession,  they  or  at 


192  EXAMINATION   OF 

least  many  of  them,  seek  to  stifle  every  inquiry  into  them, 
and  abuse  those  who  have  the  honesty  and  the  courage  to 
do  it. 

When  a  book,  as  is  the  case  with  the  Old  and  New  Testa- 
ment, is  ushered  into  the  world  under  the  title  of  being  the 
WORD  OF  GOD,  it  ought  to  be  examined  with  the  utmost 
strictness,  in  order  to  Know  if  it  has  a  well  founded  claim  to 
that  title  or  not,  and  whether  we  are  or  are  not  imposed 
upon :  for  as  no  poison  is  so  dangerous  as  that  which  poisons 
the  physic,  so  no  falsehood  is  so  fatal  as  that  which  is  made 
an  article  of  faith. 

This  examination  becomes  more  necessary,  because  when 
the  New  Testament  was  written,  I  might  say  invented,  the 
art  of  printing  was  not  known,  and  there  were  no  other 
copies  of  the  Old  Testament  than  written  copies.  A  writ- 
ten copy  of  that  book  would  cost  about  as  much  as  six  hun- 
dred common  printed  bibles  now  cost.  Consequently  was  in 
the  hands  of  very  few  persons,  and  these  chiefly  of  the 
church.  This  gave  an  opportunity  to  the  writers  of  the 
New  Testament  to  make  quotations  from  the  Old  Testa- 
ment as  they  pleased,  and  call  them  prophecies,  with  very 
little  danger  ot  being  detected.  Besides  which,  the  terrors 
and  inquisitorial  fury  of  the  church,  like  what  they  tell  us 
of  the  flaming  sword  that  turned  every  way,  stood  sentry 
over  the  New  Testament;  and  time,  which  brings  every 
thing  else  to  light,  has  served  to  thicken  the  darkness  that 
guards  it  from  detection. 

"Were  the  New  Testament  now  to  appear  for  the  first 
time,  every  priest  of  the  present  day  would  examine  it  line 
by  line,  and  compare  the  detached  sentences  it  calls  prophe- 
cies with  the  whole  passages  in  the  Old  Testament  from 
whence  they  are  taken,  why  then  do  they  not  make  the 
same  examination  at  this  time,  as  they  would  make  had  the 
New  Testament  never  appeared  before  ?  If  it  be  proper  and 
right  to  make  it  in  one  case,  it  is  equally  proper  and  right 
to  do  it  in  the  other  case.  Length  of  time  can  make  no  dif- 
ference in  the  right  to  do  it  at  any  time.  But,  instead  of 
doing  this,  they  go  on  as  their  predecessors  went  on  before 
them,  to  tell  the  people  there  are  prophecies  of  -Jesus  Christ, 
when  the  truth  is  there  are  none. 

They  tell  us  that  Jesus  rose  from  the  dead,  and  ascended 
into  heaven.  It  is  very  easy  to  say  so ;  a  great  lie  is  as 
easily  told  as  a  little  one.  But  if  he  had  done  so,  those 
have  been  the  only  circumstances  respecting  him 


THE   PROPHECIES.  193 

that  would  have  differed  from  the  common  lot  of  man ;  and, 
consequently,  the  only  case  that  would  apply  exclusively  to 
him,  as  prophecy,  would  be  some  passage  in  the  Old  Testa- 
ment that  foretold  such  things  of  him.  But  there  is  not  a 
passage  in  the  Old  Testament  that  speaks  of  a  person,  who, 
after  being  crucified,  dead,  and  buried,  should  rise  from  the 
dead,  and  ascend  into  heaven.  Our  prophecy-mongers  sup- 
ply the  silence  the  Old  Testament  guards  upon  such  things, 
by  telling  us  of  passages  they  call  prophecies,  and  that  falsely 
so,  about  Joseph's  dream,  old  clothes,  broken  bones,  and 
such  like  trifling  stuff. 

In  writing  upon  this,  as  upon  every  other  subject,  I  speak 
a  language  full  and  intelligible.  1  deal  not  in  hints  and 
intimations.  I  have  several  reasons  for  this :  First,  that  I 
may  be  clearly  understood.  Secondly,  that  it  may  be  seen 
I  am  in  earnest.  And  thirdly,  because  it  is  an  affront  to 
truth  to  treat  falsehood  with  complaisance. 

I  will  close  this  treatise  with  a  subject  I  have  already 
touched  upon  in  the  First  Part  of  the  Age  of  Reason. 

The  world  has  been  amused  with  the  term  revealed  religion, 
and  the  generality  of  priests  apply  this  term  to  tl  e  books 
called  the  Old  and  New  Testament.  The  Mahometans  apply 
the  same  term  to  the  Koran.  There  is  no  man  that  believes 
in  revealed  religion  stronger  than  I  do ;  but  it  is  not  the 
reveries  of  the  Old  and  Kew  Testament,  nor  of  the  Koran, 
that  I  dignify  with  that  sacred  title.  That  which  is  revela- 
tion to  me,  exists  in  something  which  no  human  mind  can 
invent,  no  human  hand  can  counterfeit  or  alter.  . 

The  Word  of  God  is  the  Creation  we  behold ;  and  this  word 
of  God  revealeth  to  man  all  that  is  necessary  for  man  to 
know  of  his  Creator. 

Do  we  want  to  contemplate  his  power  ?  We  see  it  in  the 
immensity  of  his  creation. 

Do  we  want  to  contemplate  his  wisdom  ?  We  see  it  in  the 
unchangeable  order  by  which  the  incomprehensible  whole  is 
governed. 

Do  we  want  to  contemplate  his  munificence  ?  We  see  it 
in  the  abundance  with  which  he  fills  the  earth. 

Do  we  want  to  contemplate  his  mercy?  We  see  it 
in  his  not  withholding  that  abundance,  even  from  the  an- 
thaiikful. 

Do  we  want  to  contemplate  his  will,  so  far  as  it  respects 
man  ?  The  goodness  he  shows  to  all,  is  a  lesson  for  our  con- 
duct to  each  other. 

9 


194  EXAMINATION   OF 

In  fine — Do  we  want  to  know  what  God  is  ?  Search  not 
the  book  called  the  Scripture,  which  any  human  hand  might 
make,  or  any  impostor  invent ;  but  the  scripture  called  the 
Creation. 

When,  in  the  first  part  of  the  Age  of  Reason,  I  called  the 
Creation  the  true  revelation  of  God  to  man,  I  did  not  know 
that  any  other  person  had  expressed  the  same  idea.  But  I 
lately  met  with  the  writings  of  Doctor  Conyers  Middletons 
published  the  beginning  of  last  century,  in  which  he  ex- 
presses himself  in  the  same  manner  with  respect  to  the 
Creation,  as  I  have  done  in  the  Age  of  Reason. 

He  was  principal  librarian  of  the  University  of  Cambridge, 
in  England,  which  furnished  him  with  extensive  opportuni- 
ties of  reading,  .and  necessarily  required  he  should  be  well 
acquainted  with  the  dead  as  well  as  the  living  languages. 
He  was  a  man  of  a  strong  original  mind ;  had  the  courage 
to  think  for  himself,  and  the  honesty  to  speak  his  thoughts. 

He  made  a  journey  to  Rome,  from  whence  he  wrote  letters 
to  show  that  tne  forms  and  ceremonies  of  the  Romish  Chris- 
tian Church  were  taken  from  the  degenerate  state  of  the 
heathen  mythology,  as  it  stood  in  the  latter  times  of  the 
Greeks  and  Romans.  He  attacked  without  ceremony  the 
miracles  which  the  church  pretend  to  perform :  and  in  one 
of  his  treatises,  he  calls  the  creation  a  revelation.  The 
priests  of  England  of  that  day,  in  order  to  defend  their 
citadel  by  first  defending  its  out-works,  attacked  him  for 
attacking  the  Roman  ceremonies ;  and  one  of  them  censures 
him  for  calling  the  creation  a  revelation — he  thus  replies  to 
him : 

"  One  of  them,"  says  he,  "  appears  to  be  scandalized  by 
the  title  of  revelation  which  I  have  given  to  that  discovery 
which  God  made  of  himself  in  the  visible  works  of  his  crea- 
tion. Yet  it  is  no  other  than  what  the  wise  in  all  ages  have 
given  to  it,  who  consider  it  as  the  most  authentic  and  indis- 
putable revelation  which  God  has  ever  given  of  himself, 
from  the  beginning  of  the  world  to  this  day.  It  was  this 
by  which  the  first  notice  of  him  was  revealed  to  the  inhabi- 
tants of  the  earth,  and  by  which  alone  it  has  been  kept  up 
ever  since  among  the  several  nations  of  it.  -From  this  the 
reason  of  man  was  enabled  to  trace  out  his  nature  and 
attributes,  and  by  a  gradual  deduction  of  consequences,  to 
learn  his  own  nature  also,  with  all  the  duties  belonging  to  it, 
which  relate  either  to  God  or  to  his  fellow-creatures.  This 
constitution  of  tHngs  was  ordained  by  God,  as  an  universal 


THE   PROPHECIES.  195 

law,  -r  rule  of  conduct  to  man — the  source  of  all  his  know- 
ledge— the  test  of  all  truth,  by  which  all  subsequent  revela- 
tions which  are  supposed  to  have  been  given  by  God  in  any 
other  manner,  must  be  tried,  and  cannot  be  received  as 
divine  any  further  than  as  they  are  found  to  tally  and  coin- 
cide with  this  original  standard. 

"  It  was  this  divine  law  which  I  referred  to  in  the  passage 
above  recited,  (meaning  the  passage  on  which  they  had  at- 
tacked him,)  being  desirous  to  excite  the  reader's  attention 
to  it,  as  it  would  enable  him  to  judge  more  freely  of  the  ar- 
gument I  was  handling.  For,  by  contemplating  this  law,  he 
would  discover  the  genuine  way  which  God  nimself  has 
marked  out  to  us  for  the  acquisition  of  true  knowledge ;  not 
from  the  authority  or  reports  of  our  fellow-creatures,  but 
from  the  information  of  tne  facts  and  material  objects  which 
in  his  providential  distribution  of  worldly  things,  he  hath 
presented  to  the  perpetual  observation  of  our  senses.  For  as 
it  was  from  these  that  his  existence  and  nature,  the  most  im- 
portant articles  of  all  knowledge,  were  first  discovered  to 
man,  so  that  grand  discovery  furnished  new  light  towards 
tracing  out  the  rest,  and  made  all  the  inferior  subjects  of 
human  knowledge  more  easily  discoverable  to  us  by  the 
same  method. 

"  I  had  another  view  likewise  in  the  same  passage,  and 
applicable  to  the  same  end,  of  giving  the  reader  a  more  en- 
larged notion  of  the  question  in  dispute,  who,  by  turning  his 
thoughts  to  reflect  on  the  works  of  the  Creator,  as  they  are 
manifested  to  us  in  this  fabric  of  the  world,  could  not  fail  to 
observe,  that  they  are  all  of  them  great,  noble,  and  suitable 
to  the  majesty  of  his  nature,  carrying  with  them  the  proofs 
of  their  origin,  and  showing  themselves  to  be  the  production 
of  an  all- wise  and  Almighty  being ;  and  by  accustoming  his 
mind  to  these  sublime  reflections,  he  will  be  prepared  to  de- 
termine, whether  those  miraculous  interpositions  so  confi- 
dently affirmed  to  us  by  the  primitive  fathers,  can  reasonably 
be  thought  to  make  part  in  the  grand  scheme  of  the  divine 
administration,  or  whether  it  be  agreeable  that  God,  who 
created  all  things  by  his  will,  and  can  give  what  turn  to 
them  he  pleases  by  the  same  will,  should,  for  the  particular 
purposes  of  his  government  and  the  services  of  his  church, 
descend  to  the  expedient  of  visions  and  revelations,  granted 
sometimes  to  boys  for  the  instruction  of  the  elders,  and  some- 
times to  women  to  settle  the  fashion  and  length  of  their 
veils,  and  sometimes  to  pastors  of  the  Church,  to  enjoin  them 


196  EXAMINATION   OF 

to  ordain  one  man  a  lecturer,  another  a  priest ; — or  that  he 
should  scatter  a  profusion  of  miracles  around  the  stake  of  a 
martyr,  yet  all  of  them  vain  and  insignificant,  and  without 
any  sensible  effect,  either  of  preserving  the  life,  or  easing 
the  sufferings  of  the  saint ;  or  even  of  mortifying  his  perse- 
cutors, who  were  always  left  to  enjoy  the  full  triumph  of 
their  cruelty,  and  the  poor  martyr  to  expire  in  a  miserable 
death.  When  these  things,  I  say,  are  brought  to  the  origi- 
nal test,  and  compared  with  the  genuine  and  indisputable 
works  of  the  Creator,  how  minute,  how  trifling,  how  con- 
temptible must  they  be  ? — and  how  incredible  must  it  be 
thought,  that  for  the  instruction  of  his  church,  God  should 
employ  ministers  so  precarious,  unsatisfactory,  and  inade- 
quate as  the  ecstacies  of  women  and  boys,  and  the  visions 
of  interested  priests,  which  were  derided  at  the  very  time  by 
men  of  sense  to  whom  they  were  proposed. 

"  That  this  universal  law  (continues  Middleton,  meaning 
the  law  revealed  in  the  works  of  the  creation)  was  actually 
revealed  to  the  heathen  world  long  before  the  gospel  was 
known,  we  learn  from  all  the  principal  sages  of  antiquity, 
who  made  it  the  capital  subject  of  their  studies  and  writings. 

"  Cicero  has  given  us  a  short  abstract  of  it  in  a  fragment 
still  remaining  from  one  of  his  books  on  government,  which 
I  shall  here  transcribe  in  his  own  words,  as  they  will  illus- 
trate my  sense  also,  in  the  passages  that  appear  so  dark  and 
dangerous  to  my  antagonists." 

"The  true  law,  (says  Cicero,)  is  right  reason  conformable 
to  the  nature  of  things,  constant,  eternal,  diffused  through 
all,  which  calls  us  to  duty  by  commanding — deters  us  from 
sin  by  forbidding ;  which  never  loses  its  influence  with  the 
good,  nor  never  preserves  it  with  the  wicked.  This  law  can- 
not be  over-ruled  by  any  other,  nor  abrogated  in  whole  or  in 
part ;  nor  can  we  be  absolved  from  it  either  by  the  senate  01 
jy  the  people ;  nor  are  we  to  seek  any  other  comment  or  in- 
terpreter of  it  but  himself;  nor  can  there  be  one  law  al 
Rome  and  another  at  Athens — one  now  and  another  here- 
after :  but  the  same  eternal  immutable  law  comprehends  all 
nations  at  all  times,  under  one  common  master  and  governor 
of  all — GOD.  He  is  the  inventor,  propounder,  enacter  of  thia 
law ';  and  whoever  will  not  obey  it  must  first  renounce  him- 
self and  throw  off  the  nature  of  man ;  by  doing  which,  he  will 
suffer  the  greatest  punishments,  though  he  should  escape  all 
the  other  torments  which  are  commonly  believed  to  be  pre- 
pared for  the  wicked."  Here  ends  the  quotation  from  Cicero. 


THE   PROPHECIES.  197 

u  Our  Doctors  (continues  Middleton)  perhaps  will  look  on 
this  as  BANK  DEISM  ;  but  let  them  call  it  what  they  will,  1 
shall  ever  avow  and  defend  it  as  the  fundamental,  essential, 
and  vital  part  of  all  true  religion."  Here  ends  the  quota- 
tion from  Middleton. 

I  have  here  given  the  reader  two  sublime  extracts  from  men 
who  lived  in  ages  of  time  far  remote  from  each  other,  but  who 
thought  alike.  Cicero  lived  before  the  time  in  which  they 
tell  us  Christ  was  born.  Middleton  may  be  called  a  man 
of  our  own  time,  as  he  lived  within  the  same  century  with 
ourselves. 

In  Cicero  we  see  that  vast  superiority  of  mind,  that  sub- 
limity of  right  reasoning  and  justness  of  ideas -which  man 
acquires,  not  by  studying  Bibles  and  Testaments,  and  the 
theology  of  schools  built  thereon,  but  by  studying  the  Crea- 
tor in  the  immensity  and  unchangeable  order  of  his  creation, 
and  the  immutability  of  his  law.  "  There  cannot"  says 
Cicero,  "  be  one  law  now,  and  another  hereafter  /  but  the 
same  eternal  immutable  law  comprehends  all  nations,  at  all 
times,  under  one  common  master  and  governor  of  all — GOD." 
But  according  to  the  doctrines  of  schools  which  priests  have 
set  up,  we  see  one  law,  called  the  Old  Testament,  given  in 
one  age  of  the  world,  and  another  law,  called  the  New  Tes- 
tament, given  in  another  age  of  the  world.  As  all  this  is 
contradictory  to  the  eternal  immutable  nature,  and  the  uner- 
ring and  unchangeable  wisdom  of  God,  we  must  be  com- 
pelled to  hold  this  doctrine  to  be  false,  and  the  old  and  the 
new  law,  called  the  Old  and  the  New  Testament,  to  be  impo- 
sitions, fables,  and  forgeries. 

In  Middleton,  we  see  the  manly  eloquence  of  an  enlarged 
mind  and  the  genuine  sentiments  of  a  true  believer  in  nis 
Creator.  Instead  of  reposing  his  faith  on  books,  by  what- 
ever name  they  may  be  called,  whether  Old  Testament  or 
New,  he  fixes  me  creation  as  the  great  original  standard  by 
which  every  other  thing  called  the  word,  or  work  of  God,  is 
to  be  tried.  In  this  we  have  an  indisputable  scale,  whereby 
to  measure  every  word  or  work  imputed  to  him.  If  the 
thing  so  imputed  carries  not  in  itself  the  evidence  of  the 
same  Almigntiness  of  power,  of  the  same  unerring  truth  and 
wisdom,  and  the  same  unchangeable  order  in  all  its  parts, 
as  are  visibly  demonstrated  to  our  senses,  and  incomprehen- 
sible by  our  reason,  in  the  magnificent  fabric  of  the  universe, 
that  word  or  that  work  is  not  of  God.  Let  then  the  two 
"•looks  called  the  Old  and  New  Testament  be  tried  by  this 


198  EXAMINATION   OF 

rule,  and  the  result  will  be,  that  the  authors  of  them,  who- 
ever they  were,  will  be  convicted  of  forgery. 

The  invariable  principles,  and  unchangeable  order,  which 
regulate  the  movements  of  all  the  parts  that  compose  tho 
universe,  demonstrate  both  to  our  senses  and  our  reason  that 
its  Creator  is  a  God  of  unerring  truth.  But  the  Old  Testa- 
ment, besides  the  numberless,  absurd,  and  bagatelle  stories 
it  tells  of  God,  represents  him  as  a  God  of  deceit,  a  God  not 
to  be  confided  in.  Ezekiel  makes  God  to  say,  chap.  14:,  ver. 
9,  "  And  if  the  prophet  be  deceived  when  he  hath  spoken  a 
thing,  I,  the  Lord  hath  deceived  that  prophet"  And  at  the 
20th  chap.  ver.  25,  he  makes  God  in  speaking  of  the  child- 
ren of  Israel  to  say,  "  Wherefore  I  gave  them  statutes  that 
were  not  good,  ana  judgments  by  which  they  could  not  live." 

This,  so  far  from  being  the  word  of  God,  is  horrid  blas- 
phemy against  him.  Reader  put  thy  confidence  in  thy  God, 
and  put  no  trust  in  the  Bible. 

The  same  Old  Testament,  after  teiling  us  that  God  created 
the  heavens  and  the  earth  in  six  days,  makes  the  same  al- 
mighty power  and  eternal  wisdom  employ  itself  in  giving 
directions  how  a  priest's  garment  should  be  cut,  and  what 
sort  of  stuff  they  should  be  made  of,  and  what  their  offer- 
ings should  be,  gold,  and  silver,  and  brass,  and  blue,  and 
purple,  and  scarlet,  and  fine  linen,  and  goat's  hair,  and  ram's 
skins  dyed  red,  and  badger  skins,  &c.  chap.  xxv.  ver.  3 ;  and 
in  one  of  the  pretended  prophecies  I  have  just  examined, 
'  God  is  made-  to  give  directions  how  they  should  kill,  cook, 
and  eat  a  he-lamb  or  a  he-goat.  And  Ezekiel,  chap.  iv.  to 
fill  up  the  measure  of  abominable  absurdity,  makes  God  to 
order  him  to  take  wheat,  and  barley r,  and  beans  and  lentilest 
and  millet,  and  fitches^  and  make  a  loaf  or  a  cake  thereof, 
and  baJ&e  it  with  human  dung  and  eat  it  j  but  as  Ezekiel 
complained  that  this  mess  was  too  strong  for  his  stomach, 
the  matter  was  compromised  from  man's  dung  to  cow  dung, 
Ezekiel,  chap.  iv.  Compare  all  this  ribaldry,  blasphemously 
called  the  word  of  God,  with  the  Almighty  power  that  crea- 
ted the  universe,  and  whose  eternal  wisdom  directs  and  gov- 
erns all  its  mighty  movements,  and  we  shall  be  at  a  loss  to 
find  a  name  sufficiently  contemptible  for  it. 

In  the  promises  which  the  Old  Testament  pretends  that 
God  made  to  his  people,  the  same  derogatory  ideas  of  him 
prevail.  It  makes  God  to  promise  to  Abraham,  that  his 
seed  should  be  like  the  stars  in  heaven  and  the  sand  on  the 
sea  shore  foi  multitude,  and  that  he  would  give  them  the 


THE  PROPHECIES. 


land  oi  Canaan  as  their  inheritance  for  ever.  But  observe, 
reader,  how  the  performance  of  this  promise  was  to  begin, 
and  then  ask  thine  own  reason,  if  tlip.  wisdom  of  God,  whose 
power  is  equal  to  his  will,  could,  consistently  with  that 
power,  and  that  wisdom,  make  such  a  promise. 

The  performance  of  the  promise  was  to  begin,  according 
to  that  book,  by  four  hundred  years  of  bondage  and  afflic- 
tion. Genesis,  chap.  xv.  ver.  13.  "  And  God  said  unto 
Abraham,  know  of  a  surety,  that  thy  seed  shall  be  a  stranger 
in  a  land  that  is  not  tJieirs,  and  shall  serve  them,  and  they 
shall  afflict  them,  four  hundred  years."  This  promise,  then, 
to  Abraham,  and  his  seed  for  ever,  to  inherit  the  land  of 
Canaan,  had  it  been  a  fact,  instead  of  a  fable,  was  to  operate, 
in  the  commencement  of  it,  as  a  curse  upon  all  the  people 
and  their  children,  and  their  children's  children  for  four 
hundred  years. 

But  the  case  is,  the  book  of  Genesis  was  written  after  the 
bondage  in  Egypt  had  taken  place  ;  and  in  order  to  get  rid  of 
the  disgrace  of  the  Lord's  chosen  people,  as  they  called  them- 
selves, being  in  bondage  to  the  gentiles,  they  make  God  to 
be  the  author  of  it,  and  annex  it  as  a  condition  to  a  pretended 
promise;  as  if  God,  in  making  that  promise,  had  exceeded 
his  power  in  performing  it,  and  consequently  his  wisdom  in 
making  it,  and  was  obliged  to  compromise  with  them  for  one 
half,  and  with  the  Egyptians,  to  whom  they  were  to  be  in 
bondage,  for  the  other  half. 

Without  degrading  my  own  reason  by  bringing  those 
wretched  and  contemptible  tales  into  a  comparative  view, 
with  the  Almighty  power  and  eternal  wisdom,  which  the 
Creator  had  demonstrated  to  our  senses  in  the  creation  of 
the  universe,  I  will  confine  myself  to  say,  that  if  we  com- 
pare them  with  the  divine  and  forcible  sentiments  of  Cicero, 
the  result  will  be,  that  the  human  mind  has  degenerated  by 
believing  them.  Man  in  a  state  of  grovelling  superstition, 
from  which  he  has  not  courage  to  nse,  loses  the  energy  of 
his  mental  powers. 

I  will  not  tire  the  reader  with  more  observations  on  the 
Old  Testament. 

As  to  the  New  Testament,  if  it  be  brougnt  and  tried  by 
that  standard,  which,  as  Middleton  wisely  says,  God  ha» 
revealed  to  our  senses  of  his  Almighty  power  and  wisdom 
in  the  creation  and  government  of  the  visible  universe, 
it  will  be  found  equally  as  fake,  paltry,  ana  absurd,  as 
the  Old. 


300  EXAMINATION   OF 

"Without  entering,  in  this  place,  into  any  othei  argument, 
that  the  story  of  Christ  is  of  huir.an  invention,  and  not  oi 
divine  origin,  I  will  confine  myself  to  show  that  it  is  dero- 
gatory to  God,  by  the  contrivance  of  it ;  because  the  means 
it  supposes  God  to  use,  are  not  adequate  to  the  end  to  be 
obtained  ;  and,  therefore,  are  derogatory  to  the  Almightiness 
of  his  power,  and  the  eternity  of  his  wisdom. 

The  New  Testament  supposes  that  God  sent  his  Son  upon 
earth  to  make  a  new  covenant  with  man ;  which  the  church 
calls  the  covenant  of  Grace,  and  to  instruct  mankind  in  a 
new  doctrine,  which  it  calls  Faith,  meaning  thereby,  not 
faith  in  God,  for  Cicero  and  all  true  Deists  always  had  and 
always  will  have  this ;  but  faith  in  the  person  called  Jesus 
Christ,  and  that  whoever  had  not  this  faith  should,  to  use 
the  words  of  the  New  Testament,  be  DAMNED. 

Now,  if  this  were  a  fact,  it  is  consistent  with  that  attri- 
bute of  God,  called  his  Goodness^  that  no  time  should  be 
lost  in  letting  poor  unfortunate  man  know  it ;  and  as  that 
goodness  was  united  to  Almighty  power,  and  that  power  to 
Almighty  wisdom,  all  the  means  existed  in  the  hand  of  the 
Creator  to  make  it  known  immediately  over  the  whole  earth, 
in  a  manner  suitable  to  the  Almightiness  of  his  divine 
nature,  and  with  evidence  that  would  not  leave  man  in 
doubt ;  for  it  is  always  incumbent  upon  us,  in  all  cases,  to 
believe  that  the  Almighty  always  acts,  not  by  imperfect 
means  as  imperfect  man  acts,  but  consistently  with  his 
Almightiness.  It  is  this  only  that  can  become  the  infallible 
criterion  by  which  we  can  possibly  distinguish  the  works  of 
God  from  the  works  of  man. 

Observe  now,  reader,  how  the  comparison  between  this 
supposed  mission  of  Christ,  on  the  belief  or  disbelief  of 
which  they  say  man  was  to  be  saved  or  damned — observe,  I 
say,  how  the  comparison  between  this  and  the  Almighty 
power  and  wisdom  of  God  demonstrated  to  our  senses  in  the 
/isible  creation,  goes  on. 

The  Old  Testament  tells  us  that  God  created  the  heavens 
and  the  earth,  and  every  thing  therein,  in  six  days.  The 
term  six  days  is  ridiculous  enough  when  applied  to  God ; 
but  leaving  out  that  absurdity,  it  contains  the  idea  of 
Almighty  power  acting  unitedly  with  Almighty  wisdom,  to 
produce  an  immense  work,  that  of  the  creation  of  the  uni- 
verse and  everything  therein,  in  a  short  time. 

Now  as  the  eternal  salvation  of  man  is  of  much  greater 
importance  than  his  creation,  and  as  that  salvation  depend^ 


THE   PROPHECIES.  201 

as  the  New  Testam  mt  tells  us,  on  man's  knowledge  of.  and 
Delief  in  the  person  called  Jesus  Christ,  it  necessarily  follows 
from  our  belief  in  the  goodness  and  justice  of  God,  and  our 
knowledge  of  his  almighty  power  and  wisdom,  as  demon- 
strated in  the  creation,  that  ALL  THIS,  if  true,  would  be  made 
known  to  all  parts  of  the  world,  in  as  little  time  at  least,  aa 
was  employed  in  making  the  world.  To  suppose  the  Al- 
mighty would  pay  greater  regard  and  attention  to  the  crea- 
tion and  organization  of  inanimate  matter,  than  he  would 
to  the  salvation  of  innumerable  millions  of  souls,  which  him- 
self had  created,  "  as  the  image  of  himself"  is  to  offer  &n 
insult  to  his  goodness  and  his  justice. 

Now  observe,  reader,  how  the  promulgation  of  this  pre- 
tended salvation  by  a  knowledge  of,  and  a  belief  in  Jesus 
Christ  went  on,  compared  with  the  work  of  creation. 

In  the  first  place,  it  took  longer  time  to  make  a  child  than 
to  make  the  world,  for  nine  months  were  passed  away  and 
totally  lost  in  a  state  of  pregnancy :  which  is  more  than 
forty  times  longer  time  than  God  employed  in  making  the 
world,  according  to  the  Bible  account.  Secondly ;  several 
years  of  Christ's  life  were  lost  in  a  state  of  human  infancy. 
But  the  universe  was  in  maturity  the  moment  it  existed. 
Thirdly  ;  Christ,  as  Luke  asserts,  was  thirty  years,  old  before 
he  began  to  preach  what  they  call  his  mission.  Millions  of 
souls  died  in  the  mean  time  without  knowing  it.  Fourthly ; 
it  was  above  three  hundred  years  from  that  time  before  the 
book  called  the  New  Testament  was  compiled  into  a  written 
copy,  before  which  time  there  was  no  such  book.  Fifthly ; 
it  was  above  a  thousand  years  after  that,  before  it  could  be 
circulated  ;  because  neither  Jesus  nor  his  apostles  had  know- 
ledge of,  or  were  inspired  with  the  art  of  printing :  and, 
consequently,  as  the  means  for  making  it  universally  known 
did  not  exist,  the  means  were  not  equal  to  the  end,  and, 
therefore,  it  is  not  the  work  of  God. 

I  will  here  subjoin  the  nineteenth  Psalm,  which  is  truly 
deistical,  to  show  how  universally  and  instantaneously  the 
works  of  God  make  themselves  known,  compared  witn  thia 
pretended  salvation  by  Jesus  Christ. 

Psalm  19th.  "  The  heavens  declare  the  glory  of  God, 
and  the  firmament  showeth  his  handy  work — -Day  unto  day 
uttereth  speech,  and  night  unto  night  showeth  knowledge — 
There  is  no  speech  nor  language  where  their  voice  is  not 
heard — Their  line  is  gone  out  through  all  the  earth,  and 
their  words  to  the  end  of  the  world.  In  them  hath  he  set  a 

0* 


802  EXAMINATION    OF   THE   PROPHECIES. 

chamber  for  the  sun.  Which  is  a  bridegroom  comiiig  out 
of  his  chamber,  and  rejoiceth  as  a  strong  man  to  run  a  race 
— his  going  forth  is  from  the  end  of  the  neaven,  and  his  cir- 
cuit unto  the  ends  of  it,  and  there  is  nothing  hid  from  the 
heat  thereof." 

Now,  had  the  news  of  salvation  by  Jesus  Christ  been  in- 
scribed on  the  face  of  the  Sun  and  the  Moon,  in  characters 
that  all  nations  would  have  understood,  the  whole  earth 
had  known  it  in  twenty-four  hours,  and  all  nations  would 
have  believed  it;  whereas,  though  it  is  now  almost  two 
thousand  years  since,  as  they  tell  us,  Christ  came  upon 
earth,  not  a  twentieth  part  of  the  people  of  the  earth  know 
any  thing  of  it,  and  among  those  who  do,  the  wiser  part  do 
not  believe  it. 

I  have  now,  reader,  gone  through  all  the  passages  called 
prophecies  of  Jesus  Christ,  and  shown  there  is  no  such 
thing. 

I  have  examined  the  story  told  of  Jesus  Christ,  and  com- 
pared the  several  circumstances  of  it  with  that  revelation, 
which,  as  Middleton  wisely  says,  God  has  made  to  us  of  his 
Power  and  Wisdom  in  the  structure  of  the  universe,  and  by 
which  every  thing  ascribed  to  him  is  to  be  tried.  The  re- 
sult is,  that  the  story  of  Christ  has  not  one  trait,  either  in 
its  character,  or  in  the  means  employed,  that  bears  the  least 
resemblance  to  the  power  and  wisdom  of  God,  as  demon- 
strated in  the  creation  of  the  universe.  All  the  means  are 
human  means,  slow,  uncertain,  and  inadequate  to  the  ac- 
complishment of  the  end  proposed,  and,  therefore,  the  whole 
is  a  fabulous  invention,  and  undeserving  of  credit. 

The  priests  of  the  present  day,  profess  to  believe  it.  They 
gain  their  living  by  it,  and  they  exclaim  against  something 
they  call  infidelity.  I  will  define  what  it  is.  HE  THAT 
BELIEVES  IN  THE  STORY  OF  CHRIST  IS  AN  INFIDEL  TO  GOD. 

THOMAS  PATCH. 


EXTRACT  FROM  A  REPLY 

TO  THI 

BISHOP  OF  LLAHDAFF. 


[This  extract  from  Mr.  Paine's  reply  to  Watson,  Bishop  of  Llandaff,  waa 
given  by  him,  not  long  before  his  death,  to  Mrs.  Palmer,  widow  of  Elihu  Pal 
mer.  He  retained  the  work  entire,  and,  therefore,  must  have  transcribed  this 
part,  which  was  unusual  for  him  to  do.  Probably  he  had  discovered  errors, 
which  he  corrected  in  the  copy.  Mrs.  Palmer  presented  it  to  the  editor  of  a 
periodical  work,  entitled  the  Theophilanthropist,  published  hi  New- York,  in 
which  it  appeared  in  1810.] 

GENESIS. 

THE  bishop  says,  "  the  oldest  book  in  the  world  is  Gene- 
sis." This  is  mere  assertion ;  he  offers  no  proof  of  it,  and 
I  go  to  controvert  it,  and  to  show  that  the  book  of  Job, 
which  is  not  a  Hebrew  book,  but  is  a  book  of  the  Gentiles, 
translated  into  Hebrew,  is  much  older  than  the  book  of 
Genesis. 

The  book  of  Genesis  means  the  book  of  Generations ;  to 
which  are  prefixed  two  chapters,  the  first  and  second,  which 
contain  two  different  cosmogonies,  that  is,  two  different  ac- 
counts of  the  creation  of  the  world,  written  by  different  per- 
sons, as  I  have  shown  in  the  preceding  part  of  this  work.* 

The  first  cosmogony  begins  at  the  first  verse  of  the  first 
chapter,  and  ends  at  the  end  of  the  third  verse  of  the  second 
chapter;  for  the  adverbial  conjunction  thuat  with  which 
the  second  chapter  begins,  shows  those  three  verses  to  be- 
long to  the  first  chapter.  The  second  cosmogony  begins  at 
the  fourth  verse  of  the  second  chapter,  and  ends  with  that 
chapter. 

*  S«K  Letter  to  Erakine,  page  220. 


204  EEPLT  TO   THE  BISHOP 

In  the  fiist  cosmogony  the  name  of  God  is  used,  without 
any  epithet  joined  to  it,  and  is  repeated  thirty-five  times.  In 
the  second  cosmogony  it  is  always  the  Lord  God,  which  is 
repeated  eleven  times.  These  two  different  styles  of  expres- 
sion show  these  two  chapters  to  be  the  work  of  two  different 
persons,  and  the  contradictions  they  contain  show  they  can- 
not be  the  work  of  one  and  the  same  person,  as  I  have 
already  shown. 

The  third  chapter,  in  which  the  style  of  Lord  God  is  con- 
tinued in  every  instance,  except  in  the  supposed  conversa- 
tion between  the  woman  and  the  serpent  (for  in  every  place 
in  that  chapter  where  the  writer  speaks,  it  is  always  the 
Lord  God)  shows  this  chapter  to  belong  to  the  second  cos- 
mogany. 

This  chapter  gives  an  account  of  what  is  called  the  fall  of 
man,  which  is  no  other  than  a  fable  borrowed  from,  and  con- 
structed upon  the  religion  of  Zoroaster,  or  the  Persians,  or 
the  annual  progress  of  the  sun  through  the  twelve  signs  of 
the  Zodiac.  It  is  the  fall  of  the  year,  the  approach  and  evil 
of  winter,  announced  by  the  ascension  of  the  autumnal  con- 
stellation of  the  serpent  of  the  Zodiac,  and  not  the  moral 
fall  of  man  that  is  the  key  of  the  allegory,  and  of  the  fable 
in  Genesis  borrowed  from  it. 

The  fall  of  man  in  Genesis,  is  said  to  have  been  produced 
by  eating  a  certain  fruit,  generally  taken  to  be  an  apple. 
Tiie  fall  of  the  year  is  the  season  for  the  gathering  and  eat- 
ing the  new  apples  of  that  year.  The  allegory,  therefore, 
holds  with  respect  to  the  fruit,  which  it  would  not  have 
done  had  it  been  an  early  summer  fruit.  It  holds  also  with 
respect  to  place.  The  tree  is  said  to  have  been  placed  in 
the  midst  of  the  garden.  But  why  in  the  midst  of  the  gar- 
den more  than  in  any  other  place  ?  The  situation  of  the- 
allegory  gives  the  answer  to  this  question,  which  is,  that  the 
fall  of  the  year,  when  apples  and  other  autumnal  fruits  are 
ripe,  and  when  days  and .  nights  are  of  equal  length,  is  the 
mid-season  between  summer  and  winter. 

It  holds  also  with  respect  to  clothing  and  the  temperature 
of  the  air.  It  is  said  in  Genesis,  chap.  iii.  ver.  21.  "Unto 
Adam  and  Ms  wife  did  the  Lord  God  make  coats  of  skins 
and  clothed  them."  But  why  are  coats  of  skins  mentioned  ? 
This  cannot  be  understood  as  referring  to  any  thing  of  the 
nature  of  moral  evil.  The  solution  of  the  allegory  gives 
again  the  answer  to  this  question,  which  is,  that  the  evil 
of  winter,  which  follows  the  fall  of  the  year,  fabulously 


OP  LLANDAFF.  205 

called  in  Genesis  the  fall  of  man,  makes  warm  clothing 
necessary. 

Bnt  of  these  things  I  shall  speak  fully  when  I  come  in 
another  part  to  treat  of  the  ancient  religion  of  the  Persians, 
and  compare  it  with  the  modern  religion  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment.* At  present,  I  shall  confine  myself  to  the  compara- 
tive antiquity  of  the  books  of  Genesis  and  Job,  taking,  at 
the  same  time,  whatever  I  may  find  in  my  way  with  respect 
to  the  fabulousness  of  the  book  of  Genesis ;  for  if  what  is 
.  called  the  fall  of  man,  in  Genesis,  be  fabulous  or  allegorical, 
that  which  is  called  the  redemption,  in  the  New  Testament, 
cannot  be  a  fact.  It  is  morally  impossible,  and  impossible 
also  in  the  nature  of  things,  tnat  moral  good  can  redeem 
physical  evil.  I  return  to  the  bishop. 

If  Genesis  be,  as  the  bishop  asserts,  the  oldest  book  in  the 
world,  and  consequently,  the  oldest  and  first  written  book 
of  the  Bible,  and  if  the  extraordinary  things  related  in  it, 
such  as  the  creation  of  the  world  in  six  days,  the  tree  of  life, 
and  of  good  and  evil,  the  story  of  Eve  and  the  talking  ser- 
pent, the  fall  of  man  and  his  being  turned  out  of  Paradise, 
were  facts,  or  even  believed  by  the  Jews  to  be  facts,  they 
would  be  referred  to  as  fundamental  matters,  and  that  very 
frequently,  in  the  books  of  the  Bible  that  were  written  by 
various  authors  afterwards ;  whereas,  there  is  not  a  book, 
chapter,  or  verse  of  the  Bible,  from  the  time  Moses  is  said  to 
have  written  the  book  of  Genesis,  to  the  book  of  Malachi, 
the  last  book  in  the  Bible,  including  a  space  of  more  than  a 
thousand  years,  in  which  there  is  any  mention  made  of  these 
things,  or  any  of  them,  nor  are  they  so  much  as  alluded  to. 
How  will  the  bishop  solve  this  difficulty,  which  stands  as  a 
circumstantial  contradiction  to  his  assertion  ? 

There  are  but  two  ways  of  solving  it. 

First,  that  the  book  of  Genesis  is  not  an  ancient  book ; 
that  it  has  been  written  by  some  (now)  unknown  person, 
after  the  return  of  the  Jews  from  the  Babylonian  captivity, 
about  a  thousand  years  after  the  time  that  Moses  is  said  to 
have  lived,  and  put  as  a  preface  or  introduction  to  the  other 
books,  when  they  were  formed  into  a  canon  in  the  time  of 
the  second  temple,  and,  therefore,  not  having  existed  before 
•  that  time,  none  of  these  things  mentioned  in  it  could  be 
referred  to  in  those  books. 

Secondly,  that  admitting  Genesis  to  have  been  written  by 
Moses,  the  Jews  did  not  believe  the  things  stated  in  it  to  be 

V  *  Not  published. 


206  RBPLY   TO   THE   BISHOP 

true,  and,  therefore  as  they  could  not  refer  to  them  as  facts, 
they  would  not  refer  to  them  as  fables.  The  first  of  these  so- 
lutions goes  against  the  antiquity  of  the  book,  and  the  second 
against  its  authenticity,  and  the  bishop  may  take  which  he 
pleases. 

But,  be  the  author  of  Genesis  whoever  he  may,  there  is 
abundant  evidence  to  show,  as  well  from  the  earlv  Christian 
writers,  as  from  the  Jews  themselves,  that  the  things  stated 
in  that  book  were  not  believed  to  be  facts.  Why  they  have 
been  believed  as  facts  since  that  time,  when  better  and  fuller 
knowledge  existed  on  the  case,  than  is  known  now,  can 
be  accounted  for  only  on  the  imposition  of  priestcraft. 

Augustine,  one  of  the  early  champions  of  the  Christian 
church,  acknowledges  in  his  City  of  God,  that  the  adven- 
ture of  Eve  and  the  serpent,  and  the  account  of  Paradise, 
were  generally  considered  as  fiction  or  allegory.  He  regards 
them  as  allegory  himself,  without  attempting  to  give  any 
explanation,  but  he  supposes  that  a  better  explanation 
might  be  found  than  those  that  had  been  offered. 

Origen,  another  early  champion  of  the  church,  says, 
"  What  man  of  good  sense  can  ever  persuade  himself  that 
there  were  a  first,  a  second,  and  a  third  day,  and  that  each 
of  these  days  had  a  night  when  there  were  yet  neither  sun, 
moon,  nor  stars.  What  man  can  be  stupid  enough  to  be- 
lieve that  God,  acting  the  part  of  a  gardener,  had  planted  a 
garden  in  the  east,  that  the  tree  of  life  was  a  real  tree,  and 
that  its  fruit  had  the  virtue  of  making  those  who  eat  of  it 
live  for  ever  ?" 

Maimonides,  one  of  the  most  learned  and  celebrated  of  the 
J  ewish  Rabbins,  who  lived  in  the  eleventh  century  (about 
seven  or  eight  hundred  years  ago)  and  to  whom  the  bishop 
refers  in  his  answer  to  me,  is  very  explicit,  in  his  book  en- 
titled More  Nevochim,  upon  the  non-reality  of  the  things 
stated  in  the  account  of  the  Creation  in  the  book  of  Genesis. 

"  We  ought  not  (says  he}  to  understand,  nor  take  accord- 
ing to  the  letter,  that  which  is  written  in  the  book  of  the 
Creation,  nor  to  have  the  same  ideas  of  it  with  common 
men ;  otherwise,  our  ancient  sages  would  not  have  recom- 
mended, with  so  much  care,  to  conceal  the  sense  of  it,  and 
not  to  raise  the  allegorical  veil  which  envelopes  the  truths  it 
contains.  The  book  of  Genesis,  taken  according  to  the  letter, 
gives  the  most  absurd  and  the  most  extravagant  ideas  of  the 
Divinity.  Whoever  shall  find  out  the  sense  of  it,  ought  to- 
restrain  himself  from  divulging  it.  It  is  a  maxim  which  all 


OF    LLANDAFF.  207 

our  gages  repeat,  and  above  all  with  respect  to  the  work  of 
six  days.  It  may  happen  that  some  one,  with  the  aid  he 
may  borrow  from  otners,  may  hit  upon  the  meaning  of  it. 
In  that  case  he  ought  to  impose  silence  upon  himself ;  or  if 
he  speak  of  it,  he  ought  to  speak  obscurely,  and  in  an 
enigmatical  manner,  as  I  do  myself,  leaving  the  rest  to  be 
found  out  by  those  who  can  understand." 

This  is,  certainly  a  very  extraordinary  declaration  of  Mai- 
monides,  taking  all  the  parts  of  it. 

First,  he  declares,  that  the  account  of  the  Creation  in  the 
book  of  Genesis  is  not  a  fact ;  that  to  believe  it  to  be  a  fact, 
gives  the  most  absurd  and  the  most  extravagant  ideas  of  the 
Divinity. 

Secondly,  that  it  is  an  allegory. 

Thirdly,  that  the  allegory  has  a  concealed  secret. 

Fourthly,  that  whoever  can  find  the  secret  ought  not  to 
teU  it. 

It  is  this  last  part  that  is  the  most  extraordinary.  Why 
all  this  care  of  me  Jewish  Rabbins,  to  prevent  what  they 
call  the  concealed  meaning,  or  the  secret,  from  being  known, 
and,  if  known,  to  prevent  any  of  their  people  from  telling 
it  ?  It  certainly  must  be  something  which  the  Jewish  nation 
are  afraid  or  asnamed  the  world  should  know.  It  must  be 
something  personal  to  them  as  a  people,  and  not  a  secret  of 
a  divine  nature,  which  the  more  it  is  known,  the  more  it 
increases  the  glory  of  the  Creator,  and  the  gratitude  and 
happiness  of  man.  It  is  not  God's  secret,  but  their  own, 
they  are  keeping.  I  go  to  unveil  the  secret. 

The  case  is,  the  Jews  have  stolen  their  cosmogony,  that  is, 
their  account  of  the  Creation,  from  the  cosmogony  of  the 
Persians,  contained  in  the  book  of  Zoroaster,  the  Persian 
lawgiver,  and  brought  it  with  them  when  they  returned  from 
captivity  by  the  benevolence  of  Cyrus,  King  of  Persia  ;  for 
it  is  evident,  from  the  silence  of  all  the  books  of  the  Bible 
upon  the  subject  of  the  Creation,  that  the  Jews  had  no  cos- 
mogony before  that  time.  If  they  had  a  cosmogony  from 
the  time  of  Moses,  some  of  their  judges  who  governed  during 
more  than  four  hundred  years,  or  of  their  kings,  the  Davids 
and  Solomons  of  their  day,  who  governed  nearly  five  hun- 
dred years,  or  of  their  prophets  and  psalmists,  who  lived  in 
the  mean  time,  would  have  mentioned  it.  It  would,  either 
as  fact  or  fable,  have  been  the  grandest  of  all  subjects  for  a 
psalm.  It  would  have  suited  to  a  tittle  the  ranting,  poetical 
genius  of  Isaiah,  or  served  as  a  cordial  to  the  gloomy  Jere- 


"208  BEPLT   TO   THE   BISHOP 

miah.     But  not  one  word  nor  even  a  whisper,  does  any  of 
the  Bible  authors  give  upon  the  subject. 

To  conceal  the  theft,  the  Rabbins  of  the  second  temple 
have  published  Genesis  as  a  book  of  Moses,  and  have  enjoined 
secrecy  to  all  their  people,  who,  by  travelling,  or  otherwise, 
might  happen  to  discover  from  whence  the  cosmogony  was 
borrowed,  not  to  tell  it.  The  evidence  of  circumstances  is 
often  unanswerable,  and  there  is  no  other  than  this  which  I 
have  given,  that  goes  to  the  whole  of  the  case,  and  this 
does. 

Diogenes  Laertius,  an  ancient  and  respectable  author  whom 
the  Bishop,  in  his  answer  to  me,  quotes  on  another  occasion, 
has  a  passage  that  corresponds  with  the  solution  here  given. 
In  speaking  of  the  religion  of  the  Persians,  as  promulgated 
by  their  priests  or  magi,  he  says,  the  Jewish  Rabbins  were 
the  successors  of  their  doctrine.  Having  thus  spoken  on  the 
plagiarism,  and  on  the  non-reality  of  the  book  of  Genesis,  I 
will  give  some  additional  evidence  that  Moses  is  not  the 
author  of  that  book. 

Eben-Ezra,  a  celebrated  Jewish  author,  who  lived  about 
seven  hundred  years  ago,  and  whom  the  bishop  allows  to 
have  been  a  man  of  great  erudition,  has  made  a  great  many 
observations,  too  numerous  to  be  repeated  here,  to  show  that 
Moses  was  not,  and  could  not  be,  the  author  of  the  book  of 
Genesis,  nor  any  of  the  five  books  that  bear  his  name. 

Spinosa,  another  learned  Jew,  who  lived  about  a  hundred 
and  thirty  years  ago,  recites,  in  his  treatise  on  the  ceremonies 
of  the  Jews,  ancient  and  modern,  the  observations  of  Eben- 
Ezra,  to  which  he  adds  many  others,  to  show  that  Moses  is 
not  the  author  of  these  books.  He  also  says,  and  shows  his 
reasons  for  saying  it,  that  the  Bible  did  not  exist  as  a  book, 
till  the  time  of  the  Maccabees,  which  was  more  than  a  hun- 
dred years  after  the  return  of  the  Jews  from  the  Babylonian 
captivity. 

In  the  second  part  of  the  Age  of  Reason,  I  have,  among 
other  things,  referred  to  nine  verses  in  the  36th  chapter  of 
Genesis,  beginning  at  the  31st  verse,  "  These  are  the  kings 
that  reigned  in  Eaom,  before  there  reigned  any  king  over 
the  children  of  Israel,"  which  is  impossible  could  have  been 
written  by  Moses,  or  in  the  time  of  Moses,  and  could  not 
have  been  written  until  after  the  Jew  kings  began  to  reign 
in  Israel,  which  was  not  till  several  hundred  years  after  the 
time  of  Moses. 

The  bishop  allows  this,  and  says  ''  I  think  you  say  true." 


OF   LLANDAFF.  209 

But  he  then  quibbles,  and  says,  that  a  small  addition  to  a 
book  does  not  destroy  either  the  genuineness  or  authenticity 
of  the  whole  book.  This  IB  priestcraft.  These  verses  do  not 
stand  in  the  book  as  an  addition  to  it,  but  as  making  a  part 
of  the  whole  book,  and  which  it  is  impossible  that  Moses 
could  write.  The  bishop  would  reject  the  antiquity  of  any 
other  book  if  it  could  be  proved  from  the  words  of  the  book 
itself  that  a  part  of  it  could  not  have  been  written  till  seve- 
ral hundred  years  after  the  reputed  author  of  it  was  dead. 
He  would  call  such  a  book  a  forgery.  I  am  authorised, 
therefore,  to  call  the  book  of  Genesis  a  forgery. 

Combining,  then,  all  the  foregoing  circumstances  together 
respecting  the  antiquity  and  authenticity  of  the  book  of 
Genesis,  a  conclusion  will  naturally  follow  therefrom ;  those 
circumstances  are, 

First,  that  certain  parts  of  the  book  cannot  possibly  have 
been  written  by  Moses,  and  that  the  other  parts  carry  no 
evidence  of  having  been  written  by  him. 

Secondly,  the  universal  silence  of  all  the  following  books 
of  the  Bible,  for  about  a  thousand  years,  upon  the  extraor- 
dinary things  spoken  of  in  Genesis,  such  as  the  creation  of 
the  world  in  six  days — the  garden  of  Eden — the  tree  of 
knowledge — the  tree  of  life — the  story  of  Eve  and  the  ser- 
pent— the  fall  of  man,  and  his  being  turned  out  of  this  fine 
garden,  together  with  Noah's  flood,  and  the  tower  of  Babel. 

Thirdly,  the  silence  of  all  the  books  of  the  Bible  upon  even 
the  name  of  Moses,  from  the  book  of  Joshua  until  the  second 
book  of  Kings,  which  was  not  written  till  after  the  captivity, 
for  it  gives  an  account  of  the  captivity,  a  period  of  about  a 
thousand  years.  Strange  that  a  man  who  is  proclaimed  as 
the  historian  of  the  Creation,  the  privy-counsellor  and  confi- 
dent of  the  Almighty — the  legislator  of  the  Jewish  nation, 
and  the  founder  of  its  religion  ;  strange,  I  say,  that  even  the 
name  of  such  a  man  should  not  find  a  place  in  their  books 
for  a  thousand  years,  if  they  knew  or  believed  any  thing 
about  him,  or  the  books  he  is  said  to  have  written. 

Fourthly,  the  opinion  of  some  of  the  most  celebrated  of 
the  Jewish  commentators,  that  Moses  is  not  the  author  of 
the  book  of  Genesis,  founded  on  the  reasons  given  for  that 
opinion. 

Fifthly,  the  opinion  of  the  early  Christian  writers,  and  of 
the  great  champion  of  Jewish  literature,  Maimonides,  that 
the  book  of  Genesis  is  not  a  book  of  facts. 

Sixthly,  the  silence  imposed  by  all  the  Jewish  Rabbins, 


210  EEPLT   TO   THE   BISHOP 

and  by  Maimonides  himself,  upon  the  Jewish  nation,  not  to 
speak  of  any  thing  they  may  happen  to  know,  or  discover, 
respecting  the  cosmogony  (or  creation  of  the  world)  in  the 
book  of  Genesis. 

From  these  circumstances  the  following  conclusions  offer — 

First,  that  the  book  of  Genesis  is  not  a  book  of  facts. 

Secondly,  that  as  no  mention  is  made  throughout  the 
Bible  of  any  of  the  extraordinary  things  related  in  Genesis, 
that  it  has  not  been  written  till  after  the  other  books  were 
written,  and  put  as  a  preface  to  the  Bible.  Every  one  knows 
that  a  preface  to  a  book,  though  it  stands  first,  is  the  last 
written. 

Thirdly,  that  the  silence  imposed  by  all  the  Jewish  Rab- 
bins, and  by  Maimonides  upon  the  Jewish  nation,  to  keep 
silence  upon  every  thing  related  in  their  cosmogony,  evinces 
a  secret,  they  are  not  willing  should  be  known.  The  secret, 
therefore,  explains  itself  to  be,  that  when  the  Jews  were  in 
captivity  in  JBabylon  and  Persia,  they  became  acquainted 
with  the  cosmogony  of  the  Persians,  as  registered  in  the 
Zend-Avesta,  of  Zoroaster,  the  Persian  lawgiver,  which,  after 
their  return  from  captivity,  they  manufactured  and  modelled 
as  their  own,  and  ante-dated  it  by  giving  to  it  the  name  of 
Moses.  The  case  admits  of  no  other  explanation.  From  all 
which  it  appears  that  the  book  of  Genesis,  instead  of  being 
the  oldest  book  in  the  world,  as  the  bishop  calls  it,  has  been 
the  last  written  book  of  the  Bible,  and  that  the  cosmogony 
it  contains,  has  been  manufactured. 

ON  THE   NAMES   IN  THE  BOOK   OF  GENESIS. 

Every  thing  in  Genesis  serves  as  evidence  or  symptom, 
that  the  book  has  been  composed  in  some  late  period  of  the 
Jewish  nation.  Even  the  names  mentioned  in  it  serve  to 
this  purpose. 

Nothing  is  more  common  or  more  natural,  than  to  name 
the  children  of  succeeding  generations,after  the  names  of  those 
who  had  been  celebrated  in  some  former  generation.  This 
holds  good  with  respect  to  all  the  people,  and  all  the  histories 
we  know  of,  and  it  does  not  hold  good  with  the  Bible.  There 
must  be  some  cause  for  this. 

This  book  of  Genesis  tells  us  of  a  man  whom  it  calls  Adam, 
and  of  his  sons  Abel  and  Seth ;  of  Enoch  who  lived  365 
years,  (it  is  exactly  the  number  of  days  in  a  year,)  and  that 
then  God  took  mm  up.  It  has  the  appearance  of  being 


OF   LLAJTDAFF.  211 

taken  from  some  allegory  of  the  Gentiles  on  the  commence- 
ment and  termination  01  the  year  by  the  progress  of  the  sun 
through  the  twelve  signs  of  the  Zodiac,  on  which  the  alle 
gorical  religion  of  the  Gentiles  was  founded. 

It  tells  us  of  Methuselah  who  lived  969  years,  and  of  a 
long  train  of  other  names  in  the  fifth  chapter.  It  then 
passes  on  to  a  man  whom  it  calls  Noah,  and  his  sons,  Shem, 
Ham,  and  Japhet :  then  to  Lot,  Abraham,  Isaac  and  Jacob, 
and  his  sons,  with  which  the  book  of  Genesis  finishes. 

All  these,  according  to  the  account  given  in  that  book, 
were  the  most  extraordinary  and  celebrated  of  men.  They 
were,  moreover,  heads  of  families.  Adam  was  the  father  of 
the  world.  Enoch,  for  his  righteousness,  was  taken  np  to 
heaven.  Methuselah  lived  to  almost  a  thousand  years.  He 
was  the  son  of  Enoch,  the  man  of  365,  the  number  of  days 
in  a  year.  It  has  the  appearance  of  being  the  continuation 
of  an  Allegory  on  the  365  days  of  a  year,  and  its  abundant 
productions.  Noah  was  selected  from  all  the  world  to  be 
preserved  when  it  was  drowned,  and  became  the  second 
lather  of  the  world.  Abraham  was  the  father  of  the  faith- 
ful multitude.  Isaac  and  Jacob  were  the  inheritors  of  hia 
fame,  and  the  last  was  the  father  of  the  twelve  tribes. 

Now,  if  these  very  wonderful  men  and  their  names,  and 
the  book  that  records  them,  had  been  known  by  the  Jews, 
before  the  Babylonian  captivity,  those  names  would  havu 
been  as  common  among  the  Jews  before  that  period  as  they 
have  been  since.  We  now  hear  of  thousands  of  Abrahams, 
Isaacs,  and  Jacobs  among  the  Jews,  but  there  were  none  of 
that  name  before  the  Babvlonian  captivity.  The  Bible  does 
not  mention  one,  though  from  the  time  that  Abraham  is  said 
to  have  lived,  to  the  time  of  the  Babylonian  captivity,  is 
about  1400  years. 

How  is  it  to  be  accounted  for,  that  there  have  been  so 
many  thousands,  and  perhaps  hundreds  of  thousands  of 
Jews  of  the  names  of  Abraham,  Isaac,  and  Jacob  since  that 
period,  and  not  one  before  ?  It  can  be  accounted  for  but 
one  way,  which  is  that  before  the  Babylonian  captivity,  the 
Jews  had  no  such  books  as  Genesis,  nor  knew  any  thing  of 
the  names  and  persons  it  mentions,  nor  of  the  things  it 
relates,  and  that  the  stories  in  it  have  been  manufactured 
since  that  time.  From  the  Arabic  name  Ibrahim  (which 
is  the  manner  the  Turks  write  that  name  to  this  day)  the 
Jews  have  most  probably  manufactured  their  Abraham. 

I  wi  1  advance  my  observations  a  point  further,  and  speal? 


212  KEPLT   TO   THE    BISHOP 

of  the  names  of  Moses  and  Aaron,  mentioned  for  the  first 
time  in  the  book  of  Exodus.  There  are  now,  and  have 
continued  to  be  from  the  time  of  the  Babylonian  captivity, 
or  soon  after  it,  thousands  of  Jews  of  the  names  of  Moses 
and  Aaron,  and  we  read  not  of  any  of  that  name  before  that 
time.  The  Bible  does  not  mention  one.  The  direct  infer- 
ence from  this  is,  that  the  Jews  knew  of  no  such  book  as 
Exodus,  before  the  Babylonian  captivity.  In  factj  that  it 
did  not  exist  before  that  time,  and  that  it  is  only  since  the 
book  has  been  invented,  that  the  names  of  Moses  and  Aaron 
have  been  common  among  the  Jews. 

It  is  applicable  to  the  purpose,  to  observe,  that  the  pictur- 
esque work,  called  Mosaic-work,  spelled  the  same  as  you 
would  say  the  Mosaic  account  of  the  creation,  is  not  derived 
from  the  word  Moses  but  from  Muses,  (the  Muses,)  because 
of  the  variegated  and  picturesque  pavement  in  the  temples 
dedicated  to  the  Muses.  This  carries  a  strong  implication 
that  the  name  Moses  is  drawn  from  the  same  source,  and 
that  he  is  not  a  real  but  an  allegorical  person,  as  Maimon- 
ides  describes  what  is  called  the  Mosaic  account  of  the  crea- 
tion to  be. 

I  will  go  a  point  still  further.  The  Jews  now  know  the 
book  of  Genesis,  and  the  names  of  all  the  persons  mentioned 
in  the  first  ten  chapters  of  that  book,  from  Adam  to  Noah : 
yet  we  do  not  hear  (I  speak  for  myself)  of  any  Jew  of  the 
present  day,  of  the  name  of  Adam,  Abel,  Seth,  Enoch, 
Methuselah,  Noah,*  Shem,  Ham,  or  Japhet,  (names  men- 
tioned in  the  first  ten  chapters,)  though  these  were,  accord- 
ing to  the  account  in  that  book,  the  most  extraordinary  of 
all  the  names  that  make  up  the  catalogue  of  the  Jewish 
chronology. 

The  names  the  Jews  now  adopt,  are  those  that  are  men- 
tioned in  Q-enesis  after  the  tenth  chapter,  as  Abraham, 
Isaac,  Jacob,  &c.  How  then  does  it  happen,  that  they  do 
not  adopt  the  names  found  in  the  first  ten  chapers  ?  Here 
is  evidently  a  line  of  division  drawn  between  the  first  ten 
chapters  of  Genesis,  and  the  remaining  chapters,  with  res- 
pect to  the  adoption  of  names.  There  must  be  some  cause 
for  this,  and  I  go  to  oifer  a  solution  of  the  problem. 

The  reader  will  recollect  the  quotation  I  have  already 
made  from  the  Jewish  Rabbin,  Maimonides,  wherein  he  says, 
"  We  ought  not  to  understand  nor  to  take  according  to  the 

*  Noah  ie  an  exception ;  there  are  many  of  that  name  among  the 
Jews.— EDITOB. 


OF   LLANDAPF.  213 

letter  that  which  is  written  in  the  book  of  the  Creation.  It 
is  a  maxim  (says  he)  which  all  our  sages  repeat  above  all, 
with  respect  to  the  work  of  six  days." 

The  qualifying  expression  above  all,  implies  there  are 
other  parts  of  the  boos,  though  not  so  important,  that  ought 
not  to  be  understood  or  taken  according  to  the  letter,  and  as 
the  Jews  do  not  adopt  the  names  mentioned  in  the  first  ten 
chapters,  it  appears  evident  those  chapters  are  included  in 
the  injunction  not  to  take  them  in  a  literal  sense,  or  accord- 
ing to  the  letter ;  from  which  it  follows,  that  the  persons  or 
characters  mentioned  in  the  first  ten  chapters,  as  Adam, 
Abel,  Seth,  Enoch,  Methuselah,  and  so  on  to  Noah,  are  not 
real  but  fictitious  or  allegorical  persons,  and,  therefore,  the 
Jews  do  not  adopt  their  names  into  their  families.  If  they 
affixed  the  same  idea  of  reality  to  them  as  they  do  to  those 
that  follow  after  the  tenth  chapter,  the  names  of  Adam, 
Abel,  Seth,  &c.  would  be  as  common  among  the  Jews  of  the 
present  day,  as  are  those  of  Abraham,  Isaac,  Jacob,  Moses 
and  Aaron. 

In  the  superstition  they  have  been  in,  scarcely  a  Jew  family 
would  have  been  without  an  Enoch,  as  a  presage  of  his  going 
to  heaven  as  ambassador  for  the  whole  family.  Every  mother 
who  wished  that  the  days  of  her  son  might  be  long  in  the 
Uwd  would  call  him  Methuselah ;  and  all  the  Jews  that 
might  have  to  traverse  the  ocean  would  be  named  Noah,  as 
a  charm  against  shipwreck  and  drowning. 

This  is  domestic  evidence  against  the  book  of  Genesis, 
which  joined  to  the  several  kinds  of  evidence  before  recited, 
shows  the  book  of  Genesis  not  to  be  older  than  the  Babylonian 
captivitv,  and  to  be  fictitious.  I  proceed  to  fix  the  character 
and  antiquity  of  the  book  of 

JOB. 

The  book  of  Job  has  not  the  least  appearance  of  being  a 
book  of  the  Jews,  and  though  printecf  among  the  books  of 
the  Bible,  does  not  belong  to  it.  There  is  no  reference  in  it 
to  any  Jewish  law  or  ceremony.  On  the  contrary,  all  the 
internal  evidence  it  contains  shows  it  to  be  a  book  of  the 
Gentiles,  either  of  Persia  or  Chaldea. 

The  name  of  Job  does  not  appear  to  be  a  Jewish  name. 
There  is  no  Jew  of  that  name  in  any  of  the  books  of  the 
Bible,  neither  is  there  now  that  I  ever  heard  of.  The  coun- 
try where  Job  is  said  or  suppos«d  to  have  lived,  or  rather 


214:  BEPLT   TO   THE   BISHOP 

where  the  scene  of  the  drama  is  laid,  is  called  Uz,  and  there 
was  no  place  of  that  name  ever  belonging  to  the  Jews.  If 
Uz  is  the  same  as  Ur,  it  was  in  Chaldea,  or  the  country  of 
the  Gentiles. 

The  Jews  can  give  no  account  how  they  came  by  this  book, 
nor  who  was  the  author,  nor  the  time  when  it  was  written. 
Origen,  in  his  work  against  Celsus,  (in  the  first  ages  of  the 
Christian  church,)  says,  that  the  Book  of  Job  is  older  than 
Moses.  Eben-Ezra,  the  Jewish  commentator,  whom  (as  I 
have  before  said)  the  bishop  allows  to  have  been  a  man  of 
great  erudition,  and  who  certainly  understood  his  own  lan- 
guage, says,  that  the  book  of  Job  has  been  translated  from 
another  language  into  Hebrew.  Spinosa,  another  Jewish 
commentator  01  great  learning,  confirms  the  opinion  of 
Eben-Ezra,  and  says  moreover,  "  Je  crois  que  Job  etait 
Gentil  :*  I  believe  that  Job  was  a  Gentile. 

The  bishop,  (in  his  answer  to  me,)  says,  "  that  the  struc- 
ture of  the  whole  book  of  Job,  in  whatever  light  of  history 
or  drama  it  be  considered,  is  founded  on  the  belief  that  pre- 
vailed with  the  Persians  and  Chaldeans,  and  other  Gentile 
nations,  of  a  good  and  an  evil  spirit." 

In  speaking  of  the  good  and  evil  spirit  of  the  Persians, 
the  bisnop  writes  them  Arimanius  and  Oromasdes.  I  will 
not  dispute  about  the  orthography,  because  I  know  that 
translated  names  are  differently  spelled  in  different  languages. 
But  he  has  nevertheless  maae  a  capital  error.  He  has  put 
the  Devil  first ;  for  Arimanius,  or,  as  it  is  more  generally 
written,  Ahriman,  is  the  evil  spirit,  and  Oromasdes  or 
Ormusd  the  good  spirit.  He  has  made  the  same  mistake  in 
the  same  paragraph,  in  speaking  of  the  good  and  evil  spirit 
of  the  ancient  Egyptians  Osiris  and  Typho,  he  puts  Typho4 
before  Osiris.  The  error  is  just  the  same  as  if  the  bishop  in 
writing  about  the  Christian  religion,  or  in  preaching  a  sermon, 
were  to  say  the  Devil  and  God.  A  priest  ought  to  know  his 
own  trade  better.  We  agree,  however,  about  tne  structure  of 
the  book-of  Job,  that  it  is  Gentile.  I  have  said  in  the  second 
part  of  the  Age  of  Reason,  and  given  my  reasons  for  it,  that 
the  drama  of  it  is  not  Hebrew. 

From  the  testimonies  I  have  cited,  that  of  Origen,  who, 
about  fourteen  hundred  years  ago,  said  that  the  book  of  Job 
was  more  ancient  than  Moses,  that  of  Eben-Ezra,  who,  in 
his  commentary  on  Job,  says,  it  has  been  translated  from 

*  Spinosa  on  the  ceremonies  of  the  Jews,  page  296,  published  in  French  at 
Amsterdam,  1678. 


OF   LLANDAPF.  215 


anothft 

into  Hebrew ;  that  of  Spinosa,  wno  not  only  says  the"  same 
thing,  but  that  the  author  of  it  was  a  Gentile ;  and  that  of 
the  bishop,  who  says  that  the  structure  of  the  whole  book  is 
Gentile.  It  follows  then  in  the  first  place,  that  the  book  of 
Job  is  not  a  book  of  the  Jews  originally. 

Then,  in  order  to  determine  to  what  people  or  nation  any 
book  of  religion  belongs,  we  must  compare  it  with  the  lead- 
ing dogmas  or  precepts  of  that  people  or  nation ;  and  there- 
fore, upon  the  bishop's  own  construction,  the  book  of  Job 
belongs  either  to  the  ancient  Persians,  the  Chaldeans,  or  the 
Egyptians ;  because  the  structure  of  it  is  consistent  with  the 
dogma  they  held,  that  of  a  good  and  evil  spirit,  called  in 
Job,  God  and  /Satan,  existing  as  distinct  and  separate  beings, 
and  it  is  not  consistent  with  any  dogma  of  the  Jews. 

The  belief  of  a  good  and  an  evil  spirit,  existing  as  distinct 
and  separate  beings,  is  not  a  dogma  to  be  found  in  any  of 
the  books  of  the  Bible.  It  is  not  till  we  come  to  the  New 
Testament  that  we  hear  of  any  such  dogma.  There  the  per- 
son called  the  Son  of  God,  holds  conversation  with  Satan  on 
a  mountain,  as  familiarly  as  is  represented  in  the  drama  of 
Job.  Consequently  the  bishop  cannot  say,  in  this  respect, 
that  the  New  Testament  is  founded  upon  the  Old.  Accord- 
ing to  the  Old,  the  God  of  the  Jews  was  the  God  of  every 
thing.  All  good  and  evil  came  from  him.  According  to 
Exodus,  it  was  God,  and  not  the  Devil,  that  hardened  Pha- 
raoh's heart.  According  to  the  book  of  Samuel,  it  was  an 
evil  spirit  from  God  that  troubled  Saul.  And  Ezekiel  makes 
God  to  say,  in  speaking  of  the  Jews,  "  I  gave  them  the  sta- 
tutes that  were  not  good,  and  judgments  Jyy  which  they  should 
*not  live."  The  bible  describes  the  God  of  Abraham,  Isaac, 
and  Jacob  in  such  a  contradictory  manner,  and  under  such 
a  two-fold  character,  there  would  be  no  knowing  when  he 
was  in  earnest  and  when  in  irony ;  when  to  believe,  and 
when  not.  As  to  the  precepts,  principles,  and  maxims,  in 
the  book  of  Job,  they  show  that  the  people,  abusively  called 
the  heathen  in  the  books  of  the  Jews,  had  the  most  sublime 
ideas  of  the  Creator,  and  the  most  exalted  devotional  moral- 
ity. It  was  the  Jews  who  dishonoured  God.  It  was  the 
Gentiles  who  glorified  him.  As  to  the  fabulous  personifica- 
tions introduced  by  the  Greek  and  Latin  poets,  it  was  a  cor- 
ruption of  the  ancient  religion  of  the  Gentiles,  which  con- 
sisted in  the  adoration  of  a  first  cause  of  the  works  of  the 
creation,,  in  which  th^  sun  was  the  great  visible  agent. 


216  REPLY   TO   THE   BISHOP 

It  appears  to  have  been  a  religion  of  gratitude  and  adora 
tion,  and  not  of  prayer  and  discontented  solicitation.  In 
Job  we  find  adoration  and  submission,  but  not  prayer. 
Even  the  ten  commandments  enjoin  not  prayer.  Prayer 
has  been  added  to  devotion,  by  the  church  of  Kome,  as  the 
instrument  of  fees  and  perquisites.  All  prayers  by  the 
priests  of  the  Christian  church,  whether  public  or  private, 
must  be  paid  for.  It  may  be  right,  individually,  to  pray 
for  virtues,  or  mental  instruction,  but  not  for  things,  ft 
is  an  attempt  to  dictate  to  the  Almighty  in  the  government  of 
the  world.  But  to  return  to  the  book  of  Job. 

As  the  book  of  Job  decides  itself  to  be  a  book  of  the 
Gentiles,  the  next  thing  is  to  find  out  to  what  particular  na- 
tion it  belongs,  and  lastly,  what  is  its  antiquity. 

As  a  composition,  it  is  sublime,  beautiful,  and  scientific  : 
full  of  sentiment,  and  abounding  in  grand  metaphorical  de- 
scription. As  a  drama,  it  is  regular.  The  dramatis  per- 
sonae,  the  persons  performing  the  several  parts,  are  regularly 
introduced,  and  speak  without  interruption  or  confusion. 
The  scene,  as  I  have  before  said,  is  laid  in  the  country  of 
the  Gentiles,  and  the  unities,  though  not  always  necessary 
in  a  drama,  are  observed  here  as  strictly  as  the  subject  would 
admit. 

In  the  last  act,  where  the  Almighty  is  introduced  as  speak- 
ing from  the  whirlwind,  to  decide  the  controversy  between 
Job  and  his  friends,  it  is  an  idea  as  grand  as  poetical  imagina- 
tion can  conceive.  What  follows  of  Job's  future  prosperity 
does  not  belong  to  it  as  a  drama.  It  is  an  epilogue  of  the 
writer,  as  the  first  verses  of  the  first  chapter,  which  gave  an 
account  of  Job,  his  country  and  his  riches,  are  the  prologue. 

The  book  carries  the  appearance  of  being  the  work  of 
some  of  the  Persian  Magi,  not  only  because  the  structure  of 
it  corresponds  to  the  dogmas  of  the  religion  of  those  people, 
as  founded  by  Zoroaster,  but  from  the  astronomical  refer- 
ences in  it  to  the  constellations  of  the  zodiac  and  other  ob- 
jects in  the  heavens,  of  which  the  sun,  in  their  religion 
called  Mithra,  was  the  chief.  Job,  in  describing  the  power 
of  God,  (Job  ix.  v.  27,)  says,  "  Who  commandeth  the  sun, 
and  it  riseth  not,  and  sealeth  up  the  stars — who  alone  spread- 
eth  out  the  heavens,  and  treadeth  upon  the  waves  of  tne  sea 
— who  maketh  Arcturus,  Orion,  and  Pleiades,  and  the  cham- 
bers of  the  south."  All  this  astronomical  allusion  is  consist- 
ent with  the  religion  of  the  Persians. 

Establishing  +!ien  the  book  of  Job,  as  the  work  of  some  of 


OP  LLANDAFF.  217 

the  Persian,  or  Eastern  Magi,  the  case  naturally  follow^ 
that  when  the  Jews  returned  from  captivity,  by  the  permis- 
sion of  Cyrus,  king  of  Persia,  they  brought  this  book  with 
them :  had  it  translated  into  Hebrew,  and  put  into  their 
scriptural  canons,  which  were  not  formed  till  after  their 
return.  This  will  account  for  the  name  of  Job  being  men- 
tioned in  Ezekiel,  (Ezekiel,  chap.  xiv.  v.  14,)  who  was  one  of 
the  captives,  and  also  for  its  not  being  mentioned  in  any  book 
said  or  supposed  to  have  been  written  before  the  captivity. 

Among  the  astronomical  allusions  in  the  book,  there  is 
one  which  serves  to  fix  its  antiquity.  It  is  that  where  God 
is  made  to  say  to  Job,  in  the  style  of  reprimand,  "  Canst 
thou  bind  the  sweet  influences  of  Pleiades"  (Chap,  xxxviii. 
ver.  31.)  As  the  explanation  of  this  depends  upon  astro- 
nomical calculation,  I  will,  for  the  sake  01  those  who  would 
not  otherwise  understand  it,  endeavour  to  explain  it  as 
clearly  as  the  subject  will  admit. 

The  Pleiades  are  a  cluster  of  pale,  milky  stars,  about  the 
size  of  a  man's  hand,  in  the  constellation  Taurus,  or  in  Eng« 
lish,  the  Bull.  It  is  one  of  the  constellations  of  the  zodiac, 
of  which  there  are  twelve,  answering  to  the  twelve  months 
of  the  year.  The  Pleiades  are  visible  in  the  winter  nights, 
but  not  in  the  summer  nights,  being  then  below  the  horizon. 

The  zodiac  is  an  imaginary  belt  or  circle  in  the  heavens, 
eighteen  degrees  broad,  in  which  the  sun  apparently  makes 
his  annual  course,  and  in  which  all  the  planets  move. 
When  the  sun  appears  to  our  view  to  be  between  us  and  the 
group  of  stars  forming  such  or  such  a  constellation,  he  is 
said  to  be  in  that  constellation.  Consequently  the  constel- 
lation he  appears  to  be  in,  in  the  summer,  are  directly  oppo- 
site to  those  ne  appeared  in  in  the  winter,  and  the  same  with 
respect  to  spring  and  autumn. 

The  zodiac,  besides  being  divided  into  twelve  constella- 
tions, is  also,  like  every  other  circle,  great  or  small,  divided 
into  360  equal  j>arts,  called  degrees  ;  consequently  each  con- 
stellation contains  30  degrees.  The  constellations  of  the 
zodiac  are  generally  called  signs,  to  distinguish  them  from 
the  constellations  that  are  placed  out  of  the  zodiac,  and  this 
is  the  name  I  shall  now  use. 

The  precession  of  the  equinoxes  is  the  part  most  difficult 
to  explain,  and  it  is  on  this  that  the  explanation  chiefly 
depends. 

The  equinoxes  correspond  to  the  two  seasons  of  the  year 
when  the  sun  makes  equal  day  and  night. 


218  REPLY   TO   THE   BISHOP 


The  following  it  a  disconnected  part  of  the  tame  work,  and  is  now  (1824)  firii 

published. 

SABBATH,  OE  SUNDAY. 

THE  seventh  day,  or  more  properly  speakii  g  the  period 
of  seven  days,  was  originally  a  numerical  division  of  time 
and  nothing  more ;  and  had  the  bishop  been  acquainted 
with  the  history  of  astronomy,  he  would  have  known  this. 
The  annual  revolution  of  the  earth  makes  what  we  call  a 
year. 

The  year  is  artificially  divided  into  months,  the  months 
into  weeks  of  seven  days,  the  days  into  hours,  &c.  The 
period  of  seven  days,  like  any  other  of  the  artificial  divisions 
of  the  year,  is  only  a  fractional  part  thereof,  contrived  for 
the  convenience  of  countries. 

It  is  ignorance,  imposition,  and  priest-craft,  that  have 
called  it  otherwise.  They  might  as  well  talk  of  the  Lord's 
month,  of  the  Lord's  week,  of  the  Lord's  hour,  as  of  the 
Lord's  day.  All  time  is  his,  and  no  part  of  it  is  more  holy 
or  more  sacred  than  another.  It  is,  however,  necessary  to 
the  trade  of  a  priest,  that  he  should  preach  up  a  distinction 
of  days. 

Before  the  science  of  astronomy  was  studied  and  carried 
to  the  degree  of  eminence  to  whicn  it  was  by  the  Egyptians 
and  Chaldeans,  the  people  of  those  times  haa  no  other  nelps, 
than  what  common  observation  of  the  very  visible  changes 
of  the  sun  and  moon  afforded,  to  enable  them  to  keep  an 
account  of  the  progress  of  time.  As  far  as  history  estab- 
lishes the  point,  the  Egyptians  were  the  first  people  who 
divided  the  year  into  twelve  months.  Herodotus,  who  lived 
above  two  thousand  two  hundred  years  ago,  and  is  the  most 
ancient  historian  whose  works  have  reached  our  time,  says, 
they  did  this  by  the  knowledge  they  had  of  the  stars.  As  to 
the  Jews,  there  is  not  one  single  improvement  in  any  science 
or  in  any  scientific  art,  that  they  ever  produced.  They 
were  the  most  ignorant  of  all  the  illiterate  world.  If  tne 
word  of  the  Lord  had  come  to  them,  as  they  pretend,  and 
as  the  bishop  professes  to  believe,  and  that  they  were  to  be 
the  harbingers  of  it  to  the  rest  of  the  world ;  the  Lord  would 
have  taught  them  the  use  of  letters,  and  the  art  of  printing  ; 
for  without  the  means  of  communicating  the  word,  it  could 
not  be  communicated  ;  whereas  letters  were  the  invention 


OF  LLANDAFF.  219 

of  the  Gentile  world ;  and  printing  of  the  modern  world. 
But  to  return  to  my  subject — 

Before  the  helps  which  the  science  of  astronomy  afforded, 
the  people  as  beiore  said,  had  no  other,  whereby  to  keep  an 
account  of  the  progress  of  time,  than  what  the  common  and 
very  visible  changes  of  the  sun  and  moon  afforded.  Thej 
saw  that  a  great  number  of  days  made  a  year,  but  the  account 
of  them  was  too  tedious,  and  too  difficult  to  be  kept  nume- 
rically, from  one  to  three  hundred  and  sixty-five  $  neither 
did  they  know  the  true  time  of  a  solar  year.  It,  therefore, 
became  necessary,  for  the  purpose  of  marking  the  progress 
of  days,  to  put  them  into  small  parcels,  such  as  are  now 
called  weeks ;  and  which  consisted  as  they  now  do  of  seven 
days.  By  this  means  the  memory  was  assisted  as  it  is  with 
us  at  this  day ;  for  we  do  not  say  of  any  thing  that  is  past, 
that  it  was  fifty,  sixty,  or  seventy  days  ago,  but  that  it  was  so 
many  weeks,  or,  if  longer  time,  so  many  months.  It  is 
impossible  to  keep  an  account  of  time  witnout  helps  of  this 
kind. 

Julian  Scaliger,  the  inventor  of  the  Julian  period  of  7,980 
years,  produced  by  multiplying  the  cycle  of  the  moon,  the 
cycle  of  the  sun,  and  the  years  of  an  indiction,  19,  28,  15, 
into  each  other;  pays,  that  the  custom  of  reckoning  by 
periods  of  seven  days  was  used  bv  the  Assyrians,  the  Egyp- 
tians, the  Hebrews,  the  people  01  India,  the  Arabs,  and  by 
all  the  nations  of  the  east. 

In  addition  to  what  Scaliger  says,  it  is  evident  that  in 
Britain,  in  Germany,  and  the  north  of  Europe,  they  reckoned 
by  periods  of  seven  days,  long  before  the  book  called  the 
bible,  was  known  in  those  parts ;  and,  consequently,  that 
they  did  not  take  that  mode  of  reckoning  from  any  thing 
written  in  that  book. 

That  they  reckoned  by  periods  of  seven  days  is  evident 
from  their  having  seven  names  and  no  more  for  the  several 
days ;  and  which  have  not  the  most  distant  relation  to  any 
thing  in  the  book  of  Genesis,  or  to  that  which  is  called  the 
fourth  commandment. 

Those  names  are  still  retained  in  England,  with  no  other 
alteration  than  what  has  been  produced  by  moulding  the 
Saxon  and  Danish  languages  into  modern  English. 

1.  Sun-day  Sunne  the  sun,  and  dag,  day,  Saxon.     Sondag, 
Danish.     The  day  dedicated  to  the  sun. 

2.  Monday,   that  is,  moonday,  from   Mbna,  the   moon, 
Saxon.     Mbano,  Danish.     Day  dedicated  to  the  moon. 


KEPLT   TO   THE   BISHOP 

3.  Tuesday,  that  is  Tuis-co's-day.    The  day  dedicated  t<* 
the  Idol  Tmsco. 

4.  Wednes-day,  that  is  Woden's-day.     The  day  dedicated 
to  Woden,  the  Mars  of  the  Germans. 

5.  Thursday,  that  is,  Thor's-day  dedicated  to  the  Ida 
Thor. 

5.  Friday,  that  is  Friga?s-day.  The  day  dedicated  to  Friga, 
the  Yenus  of  the  Saxons. 

Saturday  from  Seaten  (Saturn)  an  Idol  of  the  Saxons; 
one  of  the  emblems  representing  time,  which  continually 
terminates  and  renews  itself:  The  last  day  of  the  period  of 
seven  days.  When  we  see  a  certain  mode  of  reckoning 
general  among  nations  totally  unconnected,  differing  from 
each  other  in  religion  and  in  government,  and  some  of  them 
unknown  to  each  other,  we  may  be  certain  that  it  arises 
from  some  natural  and  common  cause,  prevailing  alike  over 
all,  and  which  strikes  every  one  in  the  same  manner.  Thus 
all  nations  have  reckoned  arithmetically  by  tens,  because 
the  people  of  all  nations  have  ten  fingers.  If  they  had 
more  or  less  than  ten,  the  mode  of  arithmetical  reckoning 
would  have  followed  that  number,  for  the  fingers  are  a  natu- 
ral numeration  table  to  all  the  world.  I  now  come  to  show 
why  the  period  of  seven  days  is  so  generally  adopted. 

Though  the  sun  is  the  great  luminary  of  the  world,  and 
the  animating  cause  of  all  the  fruits  of  the  earth,  the 
moon  by  renewing  herself  more  than  twelve  times  oftener 
than  the  sun,  which  does  it  .but  once  a  year,  served  the  rustic 
world  as  a  natural  almanac,  as  the  nngers  served  it  for  a 
numeration  table.  All  the  world  could  see  the  moon,  her 
changes,  and  her  monthly  revolutions ;  and  their  mode  of 
reckoning  time,  was  accommodated  as  nearly  as  could  pos- 
sibly be  done  in  round  numbers,  to  agree  with  the  changes 
of  that  planet,  their  natural  almanac. 

The  moon  performs  her  natural  revolution  round  the  earth 
in  twenty-nine  days  and  a  half.  She  goes  from  a  new  moon 
to  a  half  moon,  to  a  full  moon,  to  a  naif  moon  gibbous  or 
convex,  and  then  to  a  new  moon  again.  Each  of  these, 
changes  is  performed  in  seven  days  and  nine  hours ;  but 
seven  days  is  the  nearest  division  in  round  numbers  that 
could  be  taken ;  and  this  was  sufficient  to  suggest  the  uni- 
versal custom  of  reckoning  by  periods  of  seven  days,  since  it 
is  impossible  to  reckon  time  without  some  stated  period. 

How  the  odd  hours  could  be  disposed  of  without  interfer- 
ing with  the  regular  periods  of  seven  days,  in  case  the 


OF   LLANDAFF.  221 

ancients  recommenced  a  new  Septenary  period  with  every 
new  moon,  required  no  more  difficulty  than  it  did  to  regulate 
the  Egyptian  Calendar  afterwards  of  twelve  months  of  thirty 
days  eacn,  or  the  odd  hour  in  the  Julian  Calendar,  or  the 
odd  days  and  hours  in  the  French  Calendar.  In  all  cases  it 
is  done  by  the  addition  of  complimentary  days ;  and  it  can 
be  done  in  no  otherwise. 

The  bisho^  knows  that  as  the  Solar  year  does  not  end  at 
the  termination  of  what  we  call  a  day,  but  runs  some  hours 
into  the  next  day,  as  the  quarters  of  the  Moon  runs  some 
hours  beyond  seven  days ;  that  it  is  impossible  to  give  the 
year  any  fixed  number  of  days,  that  will  not  in  course  of 
years  become  wrong  and  make  a  complementary  time 
necessary  to  keep  the  nominal  year  parallel  with  the  solar 
year.  The  same  must  have  been  the  case  with  those  who 
regulated  time  formerly  by  lunar  revolutions.  They  would 
have  to  add  three  days  to  every  second  moon,  or  in  that  pro- 
portion, in  order  to  make  the  new  moon  and  the  new  week 
commence  together  like  the  nominal  year  and  the  solar 
year. 

Diodorus  of  Sicily,  who,  as  before  said,  lived  before  Christ 
was  born,  in  giving  an  account  of  times  much  anterior  to 
his  own,  speaks  of  years,  of  three  months,  of  four  months, 
and  of  six  months.  These  could  be  of  no  other  than  years 
composed  of  lunar  revolutions,  and,  therefore,  to  bring  the 
several  periods  of  seven  days,  to  agree  with  such  years  there 
must  have  been  complementary  days. 

The  moon  was  the  first  almanac  the  world  knew ;  and  the 
only  one  which  the  face  of  the  heavens  afforded  to  common 
spectators.  Her  changes  and  her  revolutions  have  entered 
into  all  the  Calendars  that  have  been  known  in  the  known 
world. 

The  division  of  the  year  into  twelve  months,  which,  as 
before  shown,  was  first  done  by  the  Egyptians,  though 
arranged  with  astronomical  knowledge,  haa  reference  to  the 
twelve  moons,  or  more  properly  speaking,  to  the  twelve  lunar 
revolutions  that  appear  in  the  space  of  a  solar  year  ;  as  the 
period  of  seven  days  had  reference  to  one  revolution  of  the 
moon.  The  feasts  of  the  Jews  were,  and  those  of  the  Christ- 
ian church  still  are,  regulated  by  the  moon.  The  Jews  ob- 
served the  feasts  of  the  new  moon  and  full  moon,  and,  there- 
fore, the  period  of  seven  days  was  necessary  to  them. 

All  the  feasts  of  the  Christian  church  are  regulated  by  the 
moon.  That  called  Easter  governs  all  the  rest,  and  the  moon 


222  REPLY   TO   THE   BISHOP 

governs  Easter.  It  is  always  the  first  Sunday  after  the  first 
full  moon  that  happens  after  the  vernal  Equinox,  or  21st  ol 
March. 

In  proportion  as  the  science  of  astronomy  was  studied  and 
improved  by  the  Egyptians  and  Chaldeans,  and  the  solar 
year  regulated  by  astronomical  observations,  the  custom  of 
reckoning  by  lunar  revolutions  became  of  less  use,  and  in 
time  discontinued.  But  such  is  the  harmony  of  all  parts  of 
the  machinery  of  the  universe,  that  a  calculation  made  from 
the  motion  01  one  part  will  correspond  with  the  motion  of 
some  other. 

The  period  of  seven  days  deduced  from  the  revolution  of 
the  moon  round  the  earth,  corresponded  nearer  than  any- 
other  period  of  days  would  do  to  the  revolution  of  the  earth 
round  the  sun.  Fifty-two  periods  of  seven  days  make  364, 
which  is  within  one  aay  and  some  odd  hours  of  a  solar  year  ; 
and  there  is  no  other  periodical  number  that  will  do  the 
same,  till  we  come  to  the  number  thirteen,  which  is  too 
great  for  common  use,  and  the  numbers  before  seven  are  too 
small.  The  custom,  therefore,  of  reckoning  by  periods  of 
seven  days,  as  best  suited  to  the  revolution  of  tne  moon, 
applied  with  equal  convenience  to  the  solar  year,  and  be- 
came united  with  it.  But  the  decimal  division  of  time,  as 
regulated  by  the  French  Calendar,  is  superior  to  every  other 
method. 

There  is  no  part  of  the  Bible  that  is  supposed  to  have  been 
written  by  persons  who  lived  before  the  time  of  Josiah, 
(which  was  a  thousand  years  after  the  time  of  Moses,)  that 
mentions  any  thing  about  the  sabbath  as  a  day  consecrated 
to  that  which  is  called  the  fourth  commandment,  or  that  the 
Jews  kept  any  such  day.  Had  any  such  day  been  kept, 
during  the  thousand  years  of  which  I  am  speaking,  it  cer- 
tainly would  have  been  mentioned  frequently  ;  and  that  it 
should  never  be  mentioned,  is  strong  presumptive  and  cir- 
cumstantial evidence  that  no  such  day  was  kept.  But 
mention  is  often  made  of  the  feasts  of  the  new  moon,  and  of 
the  full  moon ;  for  the  Jews,  as  before  shown,  worshipped 
the  moon  ;  and  the  word  sabbath  was  applied  by-the  Jews  to- 
the  feasts  of  that  planet,  and  to  those  of  their  other  deities. 
It  is  said  in  Hosea,  chap.  2,  verse  11,  in  speaking  of  the 
Jewish  nation,  "  And  I  will  cause  all  her  mirth  to  cease,  her 
feast-days,  her  new-moons,  and  her  sabbaths,  and  all  her 
solemn  feasts."  Nobody  will  be  so  foolish  as  to  contend 
that  the  sabbaths  here  spoken  of  are  Mosaic  sabbaths.  The 


OF   LLANDAFF.  228 

construction  of  the  verse  implies  they  are  lunar  sabbaths, 
or  sabbaths  of  the  moon.  It  ought  also  to  be  observed 
that  Hosea  lived  in  the  time  of  Ahaz  and  Hezekiah,  about 
seventy  years  before  the  time  of  Josiah,  when  the  law 
called  the  law  of  Moses  is  said  to  have  been  found ;  and, 
consequently,  the  sabbaths  that  Hosea  speaks  of  are  sabbaths 
of  the  Idolatry. 

When  those  priestly  reformers,  (impostors  I  should  call 
them,)  Hilkiah,  Ezra,  and  Nehemian,  began  to  produce 
books  under  the  name  of  the  books  of  Moses,  they  found 
the  word  sabbath  in  use :  and  as  to  the  period  of  seven  days, 
it  is,  like  numbering  arithmetically  by  tens,  from  time  imme- 
morial. But  having  found  them  in  use,  they  continued  to 
make  them  serve  to  the  support  of  their  new  imposition. 
They  trumped  up  a  story  of  the  creation  being  made  in  six 
days,  and  of  the  Creator  resting  on  the  seventh,  to  suit  with 
the  lunar  and  chronological  period  of  seven  days ;  and  they 
manufactured  a  commandment  to  agree  with  both.  Impos- 
tors always  work  in  this  manner.  They  put  fables  for  origi- 
nals, and  causes  for  effects. 

There  is  scarcely  any  part  of  science,  or  any  thing  in 
nature,  which  those  impostors  and  blasphemers  of  science, 
called  priests,  as  well  Christians  as  Jews,  have  not,  at  some 
time  or  othei,  perverted,  or  sought  to  pervert  to  the  purpose 
of  superstition  and  falsehood.  Every  thing  wonderful  in 
appearance,  has  been  ascribed  to  angels,  to  devils,  or  to 
saints.  Every  thing  ancient  has  some  legendary  tale  annexed 
to  it.  The  common  operations  of  nature  have  not  escaped 
their  practice  of  corrupting  every  thing. 


FUTUKE  STATE. 

The  idea  of  a  Future  state  was  an  universal  idea  to  all 
nations  except  the  Jews.  At  the  time  and  long  before 
Jesus  Christ  and  the  men  called  his  disciples  were  oorn,  it 
had  been  sublimely  treated  of  by  Cicero  in  his  book  on  old 
age,  by  Plato,  Socrates.  Xenophon,  and  other  of  the  ancient 
theologists,  whom  the  abusive  Christian  church  calls  heathen. 
Xenophon  represent*  the  elder  Cyrus  speaking  after  this 
manner : — 


224  REPLY   TO   THE   BISHOP 

"  Think  not,  my  dearest  children,  that  when  I  depart  from 
you,  I  shall  be  no  more  :  but  remember  that  mj  soul,  even 
while  I  lived  among  you,  was  invisible  to  you ;  yet  by  my 
actions  you  were  sensible  it  existed  in  this  body.  .  Believe  it 
therefore  existing  still,  though  it  be  still  unseen.  How 
quickly  would  the  honors  of  illustrious  men  perish  after 
death,  if  their  souls  performed  nothing  to  preserve  their 
fame?  For  my  own  part,  I  could  never  tnink  that  the 
soul,  while  in  a  mortal  body,  lives,  but  when  departed 
from  it  dies;  or  that  its  consciousness  is  lost,  when  it  is 
discharged  out  of  an  unconscious  habitation.  But  when  it 
is  freed  from  all  corporeal  alliance,  it  is  then  that  it  truly 
exists." 

Since. then, the  idea  of  a  future  existence  was  universal,  it 
may  be  asked,  what  new  doctrine  does  the  New  Testament 
contain  ?  I  answer,  that  of  corrupting  the  theory  of  the 
ancient  theologists,  by  annexing  to  it  the  heavy  and  gloomy 
doctrine  of  the  resurrection  of  the  body. 

As  to  the  resurrection  of  the  body;  whether  the  sama 
body  or  another,  it  is  a  miserable  conceit,  fit  only  to  be 
preached  to  man  as  an  animal.  It  is  not  worthy  to  be  called 
doctrine. — Such  an  idea  never  entered  the  brain  of  any 
visionary  but  those  of  the  Christian  church ; — yet  it  is  in 
this  that  the  novelty  of  the  New  Testament  consists.  All 
the  other  matters  serve  but  as  props  to  this,  and  those  props 
are  most  wretchedly  put  together. 


MIEACLES. 

The  Christian  church  is  full  of  miracles.  In  one  of  the 
churches  of  Brabant,  they  show  a  number  of  cannon  balls, 
which,  they  say,  the  virgin  Mary  in  some  former  war,  caught 
in  her  muslin  apron  as  they  came  roaring  out  of  the  cannon's 
mouth,  to  prevent  their  hurting  the  saints  of  her  favourite 
army.  She  does  no  such  feats  now-a-days.  Perhaps  the 
reason  is,  that  the  infidels  have  taken  away  her  muslin 
apron.  They  show  also,  between  Montmatre  and  the  village 
of  St.  Dennis,  several  places  where  they  say  St.  Dennis  stopt 
with  his  head  in  his  hands  after  it  had  been  cut  off  at  Mont- 
matre. The  Protestants  will  call  those  things  lies ;  and 


OF   LLAKDAPF.  225 

where  is  the  ]  roof  that  all  the  other  things  called  miracles 
are  not  as  gre»t  lies  as  those. 

[There  appears  to  be  an  omission  here  in  the  copy.] 

Christ,  say  those  Cabalists,  came  in  the  fulness  of  time. 
And  pray  what  is  the  fulness  of  time  ?  The  words  admit  of 
no  idea.  They  are  perfectly  Cabalistical.  Time  is  a  word 
invented  to  describe  to  our  conception  a  greater  or  less  por- 
tion of  eternity.  It  may  be  a  minute,  a  portion  of  eternity 
measured  by  the  vibration  of  a  pendulum  of  a  certain 
length  ; — it  may  be  a  day,  a  year,  a  hundred,  or  a  thousand 
years,  or  any  other  quantity.  Those  portions  are  only 
greater  or  less  comparatively. 

The  word  fulness  applies  not  to  any  of  them.  The  idea 
of  fulness  of  time  cannot  be  conceived.  A  woman  with 
child  and  ready  for  delivery,  as  Mary  was  when  Christ  was 
born,  may  be  said  to  have  gone  her  ftill  time ;  but  it  is  the 
woman  that  is  full,  not  time. 

It  may  also  be  said  figuratively,  in  certain  cases,  that  the 
times  are  full  of  events ;  but  time  itself  is  incapable  of  being 
full  of  itself.  Ye  hypocrites!  learn  to  speak  intelligible 
language. 

It  happened  to  be  a  time  of  peace  when  they  say  Christ 
was  born;  and  what  then?  There  had  been  many  such 
intervals :  and  have  been  many  such  since.  Time  was  no 
fuller  in  any  of  them  than  in  the  other.  If  he  were  he  would 
be  fuller  now  than  he  ever  was  before.  If  he  was  full  then 
he  must  be  bursting  now.  But  peace  or  war  have  relation 
to  circumstances,  and  not  to  time ;  and  those  Cabalists  would 
be  at  as  much  loss  to  make  out  any  meaning  to  fulness  of 
circumstances,  as  to  fulness  of  time ;  and  if  they  could,  it 
would  be  fatal;  for  fulness  of  circumstances  would  mean, 
when  there  are  no  more  circumstances  to  happen ;  and  ful- 
ness of  time  when  there  is  no  more  time  to  follow. 

Christ,  therefore,  like  every  other  person,  was  neither  in 
the  fulness  of  one  nor  the  other. 

But  though  we  cannot  conceive  the  idea  of  fulness  of  time, 
because  we  cannot  have  conception  of  a  time  when  there 
shall  be  no  time ;  nor  of  fulness  of  circumstances,  because 
we  cannot  conceive  a  state  of  existence  to  be  without  cir- 
cumstances ;  we  can  often  see,  after  a  thing  is  past,  if  any 
circumstance,  necessary  to  give  the  utmost  activity  and  suc- 
cess to  that  thing,  WHS  wanting  at  the  time  that  thing  took 

10* 


fiEPLT   TO  THE   BISHOP 

place.  If  such  a  circumstance  was  wanting,  we  may  be  cei 
tain  that  the  thing  which  took  place,  was  not  a  thing  ot 
God's  ordaining;  whose  work  is  always  perfect,  and  his 
means  perfect  means.  They  tell  us  that  Christ  was  the  Son 
of  God ;  in  that  case,  he  would  have  known  every  thing ; 
and  he  came  upon  earth  to  make  known  the  will  of  God  to 
man  throughout  the  whole  earth.  If  this  had  been  true, 
Christ  would  have  known  and  would  have  been  furnished 
with  all  the  possible  means  of  doing  it ;  and  would  have 
instructed  mankind,  or  at  least  his  apostles,  in  the  use  of 
such  of  the  means  as  they  could  use  themselves  to  facilitate 
the  accomplishment  of  the  mission ;  consequently  he  would 
have  instructed  them  in  the  art  of  printing,  for  the  press  is 
the  tongue  of  the  world ;  and  without  which,  his  or  their 
preaching  was  less  than  a  whistle  compared  to  thunder. 
Since,  then,  he  did  not  do  this,  he  had  not  the  means  ne- 
cessary to  the  mission ;  and  consequently  had  not  the  mis- 
sion. 

They  tell  us  in  the  book  of  Acts,  chap,  ii,  a  very  stupid 
story  of  the  Apostles'  having  the  gift  of  tongues ;  and  cloven 
tongues  of  fire  descended  and  sat  upon  each  of  them.  Per- 
haps it  was  this  story  of  cloven  tongues  that  gave  rise  to  the 
notion  of  slitting  Jackdaws  tongues  to  make  them  talk.  Be 
that  however  as  it  may,  the  gift  of  tongues,  even  if  it  were 
true,  would  be  but  of  little  use  without  the  art  of  printing. 
I  can  sit  in  my  chamber,  as  I  do  while  writing  this,  and  by 
the  aid  of  printing,  can  send  the  thoughts  I  am  writing 
through  the  greatest  part  of  Europe,  to  the  East  Indies,  and 
over  all  North  America,  in  a  few  months.  Jesus  Christ  and 
his  apostles  could  not  do  this.  They  had  not  the  means,  and 
the  want  of  means  detects  the  pretended  mission. 

There  are  three  modes  of  communication.  Speaking, 
writing  and  printing.  The  first  is  exceedingly  limited.  A 
man's  voice  can  be  heard  but  a  few  yards  of  distance  :  and 
hisperson  can  be  but  in  one  place. 

W  riting  is  much  more  extensive ;  but  the  thing  written  can- 
not be  multiplied  but  at  great  expense,  and  the  multiplication 
will  be  slow  and  incorrect.  Were  there  no  other  means  of 
circulating  what  priests  call  the  word  of  God  (the  Old  and 
New  Testament)  than  by  writing  copies,  those  copies  could  not 
be  purchased  at  less  than  forty  pounds  sterling  each  ;  con- 
sequently but  few  people  could  purchase  them,  while  the 
writers  could  scarcely  obtain  a  livelihood  by  it.  But  the 
art  of  printing  changes  all  the  cases,  and  opens  a  s«ene  aa 


OF   LLANDAJF.  827 

vast  as  the  world.  It  gives  to  man  a  sort  of  divine  attribute. 
It  gives  to  him  mental  omnipresence.  He  can  be  every 
where  and  at  the  same  instant ;  for  wherever  he  is  read  he 
is  mentally  there. 

The  case  applies  not  only  against  the  pretending  mission 
of  Christ  and  his  apostles,  but  against  every  thing  that 
priests  call  the  word  of  God,  and  against  all  those  who  pre- 
tend to  deliver  it ;  for  had  God  ever  delivered  any  verbal 
word,  he  would  have  taught  the  means  of  communicating 
it.  The  one  without  the  other  is  inconsistent  with  the  wis- 
dom we  conceive  of  the  Creator. 

The  third  chapter  of  Genesis,  verse  21,  tells  us  that  God 
made  coats  of  skins  and  clothed  Adam  and  Eve.  It  was 
infinitely  more  important  that  man  should  be  taught  the 
art  of  printing,  than  that  Adam  should  be  taught  to  make 
a  pair  of  leather  breeches,  or  his  wife  a  petticoat. 

There  is  another  matter,  equally  striking  and  important, 
that  connects  itself  with  those  observations  against  this  p»e- 
tended  word  of  God,  this  manufactured  book,  called  Re- 
vealed Religion. 

We  know  that  whatever  is  of  God's  doing  is  unalterable 
by  man  beyond  the  laws  which  the  Creator  has  ordained. 
We  cannot  make  a  tree  grow  with  the  root  in  the  air  and 
the  fruit  in  the  ground :  we  cannot  make  iron  into  gold  nor 
gold  into  iron ;  we  cannot  make  rays  of  light  shine  forth 
rays  of  darkness,  nor  darkness  shine  forth  Hght.  If  there 
were  such  a  thing,  as  a  word  of  God,  it  would  possess  the 
same  properties  which  all  his  other  works  do.  It  would 
resist  destructive  alteration.  But  we  see  that  the  book 
which  they  call  the  word  of  God  has  not  this  property. 
That  book  says,  Genesis  chap.  1,  verse  27,  "  So  God  created 
man  in  his  own  image  /"  but  the  printer  can  make  it  say, 
So  man  created  God  ^n  his  own  image.  The  words  are 
passive  to  every  transposition  of  them,  or  can  be  annihilated 
and  others  put  in  their  places.  This  is  not  the  case  with 
any  thing  that  is  of  God's  doing ;  and,  therefore,  this  book, 
called  the  word  of  God,  tried  by  the  same  universal  rule 
which  every  other  of  God's  works  within  our  reach  can  be 
tried  by,  proves  itself  to  be  a  forgery. 

The  bishop  says,  that  "  miracles  are  a  proper  proof  of  a 
divine  mission.  Admitted.  But  we  know  that  men,  and 
especially  priests,  can  tell  lies  and  call  them  miracles.  It  is 
therefore  necessary,  that  the  thing  called  a  miracle  be 


228  REPLY   TG    THE   BISHOP   OF   LLANDAFP. 

proved  to  be  true,  and  also  to  be  miraculous ;  before  it  can 
be  admitted  as  proof  of  the  thing  called  revelation. 

The  bishop  must  be  a  bad  logician  not  to  know  that  one 
doubtful  thing  cannot  be  admitted  as  proof  that  another 
doubtful  thing  is  true.  It  would  be  like  attempting  to  prove 
a  liar  not  to  be  a  liar  by  the  evidence  of  another,  who  is  as 
great  a  liar  as  himself. 

Though  Jesus  Christ,  by  being  ignorant  of  the  art  of 
printing,  shows  he  had  not  the  means  necessary  to  a  divine 
mission,  and  consequently  had  no  such  mission ;  it  does  not 
follow  that  if  he  had  known  that  art,  the  divinity  of  what 
they  call  his  mission  would  be  proved  thereby,  any  more 
than  it  proved  the  divinity  of  the  man  who  invented  print- 
ing. Something  therefore  beyond  printing,  even  if  he 
had  known  it,  was  necessary  as  a  miracle,  to  have  proved 
that  what  he  delivered  was  the  word  of  God ;  and  this 
was  that  the  book  in  which  that  word  should  be  con- 
tained, which  is  now  called  the  Old  and  New  Testament, 
should  possess  the  miraculous  property,  distinct  from  all 
human  books,  of  resisting  alteration.  This  would  be  not 
only  a  miracle,  but  an  ever  existing  and  universal  miracle ; 
whereas,  those  which  they  tell  us  of,  even  if  they  had  been 
true,  were  momentary  and  local ;  they  would  leave  no  trace 
behind,  after  the  lapse  of  a  few  years,  of  having  ever  existed ; 
but  this  would  prove,  in  all  ages  and  in  all  places,  the  book 
to  be  divine  and  not  human  ;  as  effectually,  and  as  conveni- 
ently, as  aquafortis  proves  gold  to  be  gold  by  not  being  cap- 
able of  acting  upon  it ;  and  detects  all  other  metals  and  all 
counterfeit  composition,  by  dissolving  them.  Since  then  the 
only  miracle  capable  of  every  proof  is  wanting,  and  which 
every  thing  that  is  of  a  divine  origin  possesses;  all  the 
tales  of  miracles  with  which  the  Old  and  New  Testament 
are  filled,  are  fit  only  for  impostors  to  preach  and  fools 
to  believe. 


LETTER  TO  MR.  ERSKTNE.' 


OF  all  the  tyrannies  that  afflict  mankind,  tyranny  in  reli- 
gion is  the  worst :  every  other  species  of  tyranny  is  limited 
to  the  world  we  live  in ;  but  this  attempts  a  stride  beyond 
the  grave,  and  seeks  to  pursue  us  into  eternity.  It  is  there 
and  not  here — it  is  to  God  and  not  to  man — it  is  to  a  heavenly 
and  not  to  an  earthly  tribunal  that  we  are  to  account  for  our 
belief;  if  then  we  believe  falsely  and  dishonourably  of  the 
Creator,  and  that  belief  is  forced  upon  us,  as  far  as  force 
can  operate  by  human  laws  and  human  tribunals, — on  whom 
is  the  criminality  of  that  belief  to  fall  ?  or»  those  who  impose 
it,  or  on  those  on  whom  it  is  imposed  ? 

A  bookseller  of  the  name  of  Williams  has  been  prosecuted 
in  London  on  a  charge  of  blasphemy,  for  publishing  a  book 
entitled  the  Age  of  Heason.  JBlasphemy  is  a  word  of  vast 
Bound,  but  equivocal  and  almost  indefinite  signification, 
unless  we  confine  it  to  the  simple  idea  of  hurting  or  injuring 
the  reputation  of  any  one,  which  was  its  original  meaning. 
As  a  word,  it  existed  before  Christianity  existed,  being  a 
Greek  word,  or  Greek  anglified,  as  all  the  etymological  dic- 
tionaries will  show. 

But  behold  how  various  and  contradictory  has  been  the 
signification  and  application  of  this  equivocal  word.  So- 
crates, wlio  lived  more  than  four  hundred  years  before  the 
Christian  era,  was  convicted  of  blasphemy,  for  preaching 
against  the  belief  of  a  plurality  of  gods,  and  for  preach- 
ing the  belief  of  one  god,  and  was  condemned  to  suffer 

*  Mr.  Paine  has  evidently  incorporated  into  thig  Letter  a  portion  of  his 
answer  to  Bishop  Watson's  "  Apology  for  the  Bible  ;"  as  in  a  chapter  of  that 
work,  treating  of  the  Book  of  Genesis,  he  expressly  refers  to  his  remarks,  in  a 
preceding  part  of  the  saroo,  on  the  two  accounts  of  the  creation  contained  in 
that  hook  ;  whiub  \s  >:ic)advd  in  this?  letter. 


230  LETTER   TO   MR.    EE8KINB. 

death  by  poison.  Jesus  Christ  was  convicted  of  blasphemy 
under  the  Jewish  law,  and  was  crucified.  Calling  Mahomet 
an  impostor  would  be  blasphemy  in  Turkey ;  and  denying 
the  infallibility  of  the  Pope,  and  the  Church,  would  be  blas- 
phemy at  Rome.  What  then  is  to  be  understood  by  this 
word  blasphemy  ?  "We  see  that  in  the  case  of  Socrates  truth 
was  condemned  as  blasphemy.  Are  we  sure  that  truth  is 
not  blasphemy  in  the  present  day  ?  Woe,  however,  be  to 
those  who  make  it  so,  whoever  they  may  be. 

A  book  called  the  Bible  has  been  voted  by  men,  and 
decreed  by  human  laws  to  be  the  word  of  God ;  and.  the 
disbelief  of  this  is  called  blasphemy.  But  if  the  Bible  be 
not  the  word  of  God,  it  is  the  laws  and  the  execution  of 
them  that  is  blasphemy,  and  not  the  disbelief.  Strange 
stories  are  told  of  the  Creator  in  that  book.  He  is  repre- 
sented as  acting  under  the  influence  of  every  human  passion, 
even  of  the  most  malignant  kind.  If  these  stories  are  false, 
we  err  in  believing  them  to  be  true,  and  ought  not  to  believe 
them.  It  is,  therefore,  a  duty  which  every  man  owes  to  him- 
self, and  reverentially  to  his  Maker,  to  ascertain,  by  every 
possible  inquiry,  whether  there  be  sufficient  evidence  to 
believe  them  or  not. 

My  own  opinion  is,  decidedly,  that  the  evidence  does  not 
warrant  the  belief,  and  that  we  sin  in  forcing  that  belief  upon 
ourselves  and  upon  others.  In  saying  this,  I  have  no  other 
object  in  view  than  truth.  But  that  I  may  not  be  accused 
of  resting  upon  bare  assertion  with  respect  to  the  equivocal 
state  of  the  JBible,  I  will  produce  an  example,  and  I  will  not 
pick  and  cull  the  Bible  for  the  purpose.  I  will  go  fairly  to 
the  case :  I  will  take  the  two  first  chapters  of  Genesis  as 
they  stand,  and  show  from  thence  the  truth  of  what  I  say, 
that  is,  that  the  evidence  does  not  warrant  the  belief  that 
the  Bible  is  the  word  of  God. 


CHAPTER  L 

1.  In  the  beginning  God  created  the  heavens  and  the 
earth. 

2.  And  the  earth  was  without  form  and  void,  and  dark- 
ness was  upon  the  face  of  the  deep ;  and  the  spirit  of  God 
moved  upon  the  face  of  the  waters. 


LETTER  TO   MR.    EBSKINB.  231 

3.  And  God  said,  Let  there  be  light ;  and  there  was  light. 

4.  Aiid  God  saw  the  light,  that  it  was  good  ;  and  God  di- 
vided the  light  from  the  darkness. 

5.  And  God  called  the  light  day,  and  the  darkness  he 
called  night :  and  the  evening  and  the  morning  were  the 
first  day. 

6.  ^  And  God  said,  Let  there  be  a  firmament  in  the  midst 
of  the  waters,  and  let  it  divide  the  waters  from  the  waters. 

7.  And  God  made  the  firmament,  and  divided  the  waters 
which  were  *under  the  firmament,  from  the  waters  which 
were  above  the  firmament :  and  it  was  so. 

8.  And  God  called  the  firmament  heaven :  and  the  evening 
and  the  morning  were  the  second  day. 

9.  T  And  God  said,  Let  the  waters  under  the  heaven  be 
gathered  together  unto  one  place,  and  let  the  dry  land  ap- 
pear :  and  it  was  so. 

10.  And  God  called  the  dry  land  earth,  and  the  gathering 
together  of  the  waters  called  he  seas,  and  God  saw  that  it 
was  good. 

11.  And  God  said,  Let  the  earth  bring  forth  grass,  the 
herb,  yielding  seed,  and  the  fruit-tree  yielding  fruit  after  his 
kind,  whose  seed  is  in  itself,  upon  the  earth,  and  it  was  so. 

12.  And  the  earth  brought  forth  grass,  and  herb  yielding 
seed  after  his  kind,  and  the  tree  yielding  fruit,  whose  seed 
was  in  itself,  after  his  kind  :  and  God  saw  that  it  was  good. 

13.  And  the  evening  and  the  morning  were  the  third  day. 

14.  T  And  God  saia,  Let  there  be  lignts  in  the  firmament 
of  the  heaven,  to  divide  the  day  from  the  night :  and  let 
them  be  for  signs,  and  for  seasons,  and  for  days,  and  years. 

15.  And  let  them  be  for  lights  in  the  firmament  of  the 
heaven,  to  give  light  upon  the  earth :  and  it  was  so. 

16.  And  God  made  two  great  lights  ;  the  greater  light  to 
rule  the  day,  and  the  lesser  light  to  rule  the  night ;  he  made 
the  stars  also. 

IT.  And  God  set  them  in  the  firmament  of  the  heaven, 
to  give  light  upon  the  earth, 

18.  And  to  rule  over  the  day  and  over  the  night,  and  to 
divide  the  light  from  the  darkness ;  and  God  saw  that  it  was 
good. 

19.  And  the  evening  and  the  morning  were  the  fourth 
day. 

20.  T  And  God  said,  Let  the  waters  bring  forth  abundantly 
the  moving  creature  that  hath  life,  and  fowl  that  may  fly 
above  the  earth  ir  the  open  firmament  of  heaven. 


232  LETTEE   TO   ME.    ERSKHTB. 

21.  Am .  God  created  great  whales,  and  every  living  crea 
tare  that  moveth,  which  the  waters  brought  fortn  abundantly 
after  their  kind,  and  every  winged  fowl  after  his  kind :  and 
God  saw  that  it  was  good. 

22.  And  God  blessed  them,  saying,  Be  fruitful,  and  multi- 
ply, and  fill  the  waters  in  the  seas,  and  let  fowl  multiply  in 
the  earth. 

23.  And  the  evening  and  the  morning  were  the  fifth  day. 

24.  T  And  God  said,  Let  the  earth  bring  forth  the  living 
creature  after  his  kind,  cattle  and  creeping  thing  and  beast 
of  the  earth  after  his  kind :  and  it  was  so. 

25.  And  God  made  the  beast  of  the  earth  after  his  kind, 
and  cattle  after  their  kind,  and  every  thing  that  creepeth 
upon  the  earth  after  his  kind :  and  God  saw  that  it  was  good. 

26.  T  And  God  said,  Let  us  make  man  in  our  image,  after 
our  likeness :  and  let  them  have  dominion  over  the  fish  of 
the  sea,  and  over  the  fowl  of  the  air,  and  over  the  cattle,  and 
over  all  the  earth,  and  over  every  creeping  thing  that  creep- 
eth upon  the  earth. 

27.  So  God  created  man  in  his  own  ^mage,  in  the  image 
of  God  created  he  him  :  male  and  female  created  he  them. 

28.  And  God  blessed  them,  and  God  said  unto  them,  Be 
fruitful,  and  multiply,  and  replenish  the  earth,  and  subdue 
it ;  and  have  dominion  over  the  fish  of  the  sea,  and  over  the 
fowl  of  the  air,  and  over  every  thing  that  moveth  upon  the 
earth. 

29.  T  And  God  said,  Behold,  I  have  given  you  every  herb 
bearing  seed,  which  is  upon  the  face  of  all  the  earth,  and 
every  tree,  in  which  is  the  fruit  of  a  tree  yielding  seed :  to 
you  it  shall  be  for  meat. 

30.  And  to  every  beast  of  the  earth,  and  to  every  fowl  of 
the  air,  and  to  every  thing  that  creepeth  upon  the  earth, 
wherein  there  is  life,  I  have  given  every  green  herb  for  meat ; 
and  it  was  so. 

31.  And  God  saw  every  thing  that  he  had  made,  and  be- 
hold it  was  very  good.     And  the  evening  and  the  morning 
were  the  sixth  day. 


OHAPTEK   II. 

1.  Thus  the  heavens  and  the  earth  were  finished,  and  all 
the  host  of  them. 


LETTER   TO   MB.    ERSKDTK.  233 

2.  And  on  the  seventh  day  God  ended  his  work  which  he 
Lad  made,  and  he  rested  on  the  seventh  day  from  all  hit 
work  which  he  had  made. 

3.  And  God  blessed  the  seventh  day  and  sanctified  it : 
because  that  in  it  he  had  rested  from  all  his  work,  which 
God  created  and  made. 


4.  T  These  are  the  generations  of  the  heavens  and  of  the 
earth,  when  they  were  created ;  in  the  day  that  the  Lord 
God  made  the  earth  and  the  heavens. 

5.  And  every  plant  of  the  field,  before  it  was  in  the  earth, 
and  every  herb  of  the  field,  before  it  grew ;  for  the  Lora 
God  had  not  caused  it  to  rain  upon  the  earth,  and  there  was 
not  a  man  to  till  the  ground. 

6.  But  there  went  up  a  mist  from  the  earth,  and  watered 
the  whole  face  of  the  ground. 

7.  And  the  Lord  God  formed  man  of  the  dust  of  the 
ground,  and  breathed  into  his  nostrils  the  breath  of  life ;  and 
man  became  a  living  soul. 

8.  And  the  Lord  God  planted  a  garden  eastward  of  Eden ; 
and  there  he  put  the  man  whom  he  had  formed. 

9.  And  out  of  the  ground  made  the  Lord  God  to  grow 
every  tree  that  is  pleasant  to  the  sight,  and  good  for  food ; 
the  tree  of  life  also  in  the  midst  of  the  garden,  and  the  tree 
of  knowledge  of  good  and  evil. 

10.  And  a  river  went  out  of  Eden  to  water  the  garden : 
and  from  thence  it  was  parted,  and  became  into  four  heads. 

11.  The  name  of  the  first  is  Pison :  that  is  it  which  com- 
passeth  the  whole  land  of  Havilah,  where  there  is  gold. 

12.  And  the  gold  of  that  land  is  good :  there  is  bdellium 
and  the  onyx-stone. 

13.  And  the  name  of  the  second  river  is  Gibon :  the  same 
is  it  that  compasseth  the  whole  land  of  Ethiopia. 

14.  And  the  name  of  the  third  river  is  Heddekel :  that  is 
it  whichgoeth  toward  the  east  of  Assyria.    And  the  fourth 
river  is  Euphrates. 

15.  And  the  Lord  God  took  the  man,  and  put  him  into  the 
garden  of  Eden,  to  dress  it  and  to  keep  it. 

16.  And  the  Lord  God  commanded  the  man,  saying,  of 
every  tree  of  the  garden  thou  mayest  freely  eat : 

17.  But  of  the  tree  of  the  knowledge  of  good  and  evil, 


234  LETTER   TO   ME.    EKSKINE. 

thou  shalt  not  eat  of  it;  for  in  the  day  that  thou  eatest 
thereof,  thou  shalt  surely  die. 

18.  ^  And  the  Lord  God  said,  it  is  not  good  that  the  man 
should  be  alone :  I  will  make  him  an  help  meet  for  him. 

19.  And  out  of  the  ground  the  Lord  God  formed  every 
beast  of  the  field,  and  every  fowl  of  the  air,  and  brought 
them  unto  Adam,  to  see  what  he  would  call  them;  and 
whatsoever  Adam  called  every  living  creature,  that  was  the 
name  thereof. 

20.  And  Adam  gave  names  to  all  cattle,  and  to  the  fowl 
of  the  air,  and  to  every  beast  of  the  field ;  but  for  Adam  there 
was  not  found  an  help  meet  for  him. 

21.  And  the  Lord  God  caused  a  deep  sleep  to  fall  upon 
Adam,  and  he  slept ;  and  he  took  one  of  his  ribs,  and  closed 
up  the  flesh  instead  thereof. 

22.  And  the  rib  which  the  Lord  God  had  taken  from  man, 
made  he  a  woman,  and  brought  her  unto  the  man. 

23.  And  Adam  said,  this  is  now  bone  of  my  bones  and 
flesh  of  my  flesh ;  she  shall  be  called  woman,  because  she 
was  taken  out  of  man. 

24.  Therefore  shall  a  man  leave  his  father  and  his  mother, 
and  shall  cleave  unto  his  wife ;  and  they  shall  be  one  flesh. 

25.  And  they  were  both  naked,  the  man  and  his  wife,  and 
were  not  ashamed. 


These  two  chapters  are  called  the  Mosaic  account  of  the 
creation ;  and  we  are  told,  nobody  knows  by  whom,  that 
Moses  was  instructed  by  God  to  write  that  account. 

It  has  happened  that  every  nation  of  people  has  been 
world-makers ;  and  each  makes  the  world  to  begin  his  own 
way,  as  if  they  had  all  been  brought  up,  as  Hudibras  says, 
to  the  trade.  There  are  hundreds  of  different  opinions  and 
traditions  how  the  world  began.*  My  business,  however,  in 
this  place,  is  only  with  those  two  chapters. 

*  In  this  world-making  trade,  man,  of  course,  has  held  a  conspicuous  place ; 
and,  for  the  gratification  of  the  curious  enquirer,  the  editor  subjoins  two  spe- 
cimens of  the  opinions  of  learned  men,  in  regard  to  the  manner  of  his  forma- 
tion, and  of  his  subsequent  fall.  The  first  he  extracts  from  the  Talmud,  a  work 
containing  the  Jewish  traditions,  the  rabbinical  constitutions,  and  explication 
of  the  law ;  and  is  of  great  authority  among  the  Jews.  It  was  composed  by 
certain  learned  rabbins,  comprehends  twelve  bulky  folios,  and  forty  years  are 
said  to  have  been  consumed  i  i  its  compilation.  In  fact,  it  is  deemed  to  con- 
tain the  whole  body  of  divinity  for  the  Jewish  nation.  Although  the  Scriptures 


LETTER   TO   MB.    ERSKTXE.  235 

I  begin  then  by  saying,  that  those  two  chapters,  instead 
of  containing,  as  has  been  believed,  one  continued  account 
of  the  creation,  written  by  Moses,  contain  two  different  and 

tell  us  that  the  Lord  God  formed  man  of  the  dust  of  the  ground,  they  do  not  ex- 
plain the  manner  in  which  it  was  done,  and  these  doctors  supply  the  deficiency 
as  follows : — 

"  Adam's  body  was  made  of  the  earth  of  Babylon,  his  head  of  the  land  of 
Israel,  his  other  members  of  other  parts  of  the  world.  R.  Meir  thought  he  was 
compact  of  the  earth,  gathered  out  of  the  whole  earth ;  as  it  is  written,  thine 
•yes  did  see  my  substance.  Now  it  S?  elsewhere  written,  the  eye*  of  the  Lord  are 
over  all  the  earth.  R.  Aha  expressly  marks  the  twelve  hours  in  which  his  va- 
rious parts  were  formed.  His  stature  was  from  one  end  of  the  world  to  the 
other ;  and  it  was  for  his  transgression  that  the  Creator,  laying  his  hand  in 
anger  on  him,  lessened  him ;  for  before,  says  R.  Eleazer,  with  his  hand  he 
reached  the  firmament.  R.  Jehuda  thinks  his  sin  was  heresy ;  but  R.  Isaac 
thinks  it  was  nourishing  his  foreskin." 

The  Mahometan  savans  give  the  following  account  of  the  same  transac- 
tion :  — 

"  When  God  wished  to  create  man,  he  sent  the  angel  Gabriel  to  take  a  hand- 
ful of  each  of  the  seven  beds  which  composed  the  earth.  But  when  the  latter 
heard  the  order  of  God,  she  felt  much  alarmed,  and  requested  the  heavenly 
messenger  to  represent  to  God,  that  as  the  creature  he  was  about  to  form 
might  chance  to  rebel  one 'day  against  him,  this  would  be  the  means  of  bring- 
ing upon  herself  the  divine  malediction.  God,  however,  far  from  listening 
to  this  request,  despatched  two  other  angels,  Michael  and  Azrael,  to  execute 
his  will ;  but  they,  moved  with  compassion,  were  prevailed  upon  again  to  lay 
the  complaints  of  the  earth  at  the  feet  of  her  author.  Then  God  confined 
the  execution  of  his  commands  to  the  formidable  Azrael  alone,  who,  regard- 
less of  all  the  earth  rr-'ght  say,  violently  tore  from  her  bosom  seven  hand- 
fuls  from  her  various  strata,  and  carried  them  into  Arabia,  where  the  work 
of  creation  was  to  oe  completed.  As  to  Asrael,  God  wus  so  well  pleased 
with  the  decisive  manner  in  which  he  had  acted,  that  he  gave  him  the 
office  of  separating  the  soul  from  the  body,  whence  he  is  called  the  Angel  of 
Death. 

"  Meanwhile,  the  angels  having  kneaded  this  earth,  God  moulded  it  with  his 
own  hands,  and  left  it  some  time  that  it  might  get  dry.  The  angels  delighted 
to  gaze  upon  the  lifeless,  but  beautiful  mass,  with  the  exception  of  Eblis,  or 
Lucifer,  who,  bent  upon  evil,  struck  it  upon  the  stomach,  which  giving  a  hol- 
low sound,  he  said,  since  this  creature  will  be  hollow,  it  will  often  need  being 
filled,  and  will  be,  therefore,  exposed  to  pregnant  temptations.  Upon  this,  he 
asked  the  angels  how  they  would  act  if  God  wished  to  render  them  dependent 
upon  this  sovereign  which  he  was  about  to  give  to  the  earth.  They  readily 
answered  that  they  would  obey ;  but  though  Eblis  did  not  openly  dissent ,  he  • 
resolved  within  himself  that  he  would  not  follow  their  example. 

"  After  the  body  of  the  first  man  had  been  properly  prepared,  God  animated 
it  with  an  intelligent  soul,  and  clad  him  in  splendid  and  marvellous  garments, 
auited  to  the  dignity  of  this  favored  being.  He  now  commanded  his  angels  to 
fall  prostrate  before  Adam.  All  of  them  obeyed,  with  the  exception  of  Eblis, 
who  waa  in  consequence  immediately  expelled  from  heaven,  and  his  place  given 
to  Adam. 

"  The  formation  of  Eve  from  one  of  the  ribs  of  the  first  man,  is  the  same  ai 
that  recorded  in  the  Bible,  as  is  also  the  order  given  to  the  father  of  mankind, 
not  to  taste  the  fruit  of  a  particular  tree.  Eblis  seized  this  opportunity  of  re- 
venge. Having  associated  the  peacock  and  the  serpent  in  the  enterprise,  they 
by  their  wily  speeches  at  length  persuaded  Adam  to  become  guilty  of  disobo- 


236  LETTER   TO   ME.    ERSKOTE. 

contradictory  stories  of  a  creation,  made  by  two  different- 
persons,  and  written  in  two  different  styles  of  expression. 
The  evidence  that  shows  this  is  so  clear,  when  attended  to 
without  prejudice,  that,  did  we  meet  with  the  same  evidence 
in  any  Arabic  or  Chinese  account  of  a  creation,  we  should 
not  hesitate  in  pronouncing  it  a  forgery. 

I  proceed  to  distinguish  the  two  stories  from  each  other. 

The  first  story  begins  at  the  first  verse  of  the  first  chapter, 
and  ends  at  the  end  of  the  third  verse  of  the  second  chapter ; 
for  the  adverbial  coni  unction,  THUS,  with  which  the  second 
chapter  begins,  (as  the  reader  will  see,)  connects  itself  to  the 
last  verse  of  the  first  chapter,  and  those  three  verses  belong 
to,  and  make  the  conclusion  of  the  first  story. 

The  second  story  begins  at  the  fourth  verse  of  the  second 
chapter,  and  ends  with  that  chapter.  Those  two  stories  have 
been  confused  into  one,  by  cutting  off  the  three  last  verses 
of  the  first  story,  and  throwing  them  to  the  second  chapter. 

I  go  now  to  show  that  those  two  stories  have  been  written 
by  two  different  persons. 

From  the  first  verse  of  the  first  chapter  to  the  end  of  the 
third  verse  of  the  second  chapter,  which  makes  the  whole  of 
the  first  story,  the  word  GOD  is  used  without  any  epithet  01 
additional  word  conjoined  with  it,  as  the  reader  will  see : 
and  this  style  of  expression  is  invariably  used  throughout 
the  whole  of  this  story,  and  is  repeated  no  less  than  thirty- 
five  times,  viz.  "  In  the  beginning  GOD  created  the  heavens 
and  the  earth,  and  the  spirit  of  GOD  moved  on  the  face  of 
the  waters,  and  GOD  said,  let  there  be  light,  and  GOD  saw  the 
light,"  &c.,  &c. 

But  immediately  from  the  beginning  of  the  fourth  verse 

dience.  But  no  sooner  had  they  touched  the  forbidden  fruit,  than  their  gar- 
ments dropped  on  the  ground,  and  the  sight  of  their  nakedness  covered  them 
both  with  shame  and  with  confusion.  They  made  a  covering  for  their  body 
with  fig  leaves ;  but  they  were  both  immediately  condemned  to  labour,  and  to 
die,  and  hurled  down  from  Paradise. 

"  Adam  fell  upon  the  mountain  of  Sarendip,  in  the  island  of  Ceylon,  where  a 
mountain  is  called  by  his  name  to  the  present  day.  Eve.  being  separated  from 
her  spouse  in  her  fall,  alighted  on  the  spot  where  China  now  stands,  and  Eblis 
fell  cot  far  from  the  same  spot.  As  to  the  peacock  and  the  snake,  the  former 
dropped  in  Hindostan  and  the  latter  in  Arabia.  Adam  soon  feeling  the  enor- 
mity of  his  fault,  implored  the  mercy  of  God,  who  relenting,  sent  down  hia 
angels  from  heaven  with  a  tabernacle,  which  they  placed  on  the  spot  where 
Abraham,  at  a  subsequent  period,  built  the  temple  of  Mecca.  Gabriel  in- 
structed him  in  the  rites  and  ceremonies  performed  about  the  sanctuary,  in 
order  that  he  might  obtain  the  forgiveness  of  his  offence,  and  afterwards  led 
him  to  the  mountain  of  Ararat,  where  he  met  Eve,  from  whom  he  had  been 
new  separated  above  two  hundred  years." 


LETTER   TO   MB.    ER8KINB.  337 

of  the  second  chapter,  where  the  second  story  begins,  the 
style  of  expression  is  always  the  Lord  God,  and  this  style  of 
expression  is  invariably  used  to  the  end  of  the  chapter,  and 
is  repeated  eleven  times ;  in  the  one  it  is  always  GOD,  and 
never  the  Lord  God,  in  the  other  it  is  alwavs  the  Lord  God 
and  never  GOD.  The  first  story  contains  thirty-four  verses, 
and  repeats  the  single  word  GOD  thirty-five  times.  The 
second  story  contains  twenty-two  verses  and  repeats  the 
compound  word  Lord- God  eleven  times;  this  difference  of 
style,  so  often  repeated,  and  so  uniformily  continued,  shows, 
that  those  two  chapters,  containing  two  different  stories,  are 
written  by  different  persons ;  it  is  the  same  in  all  different 
editions  of  the  Bible,  in  all  the  languages  I  have  seen. 

Having  thus  shown,  from  the  difference  of  style,  that 
those  two  chapters  divided,  as  they  properly  divide  them- 
selves, at  the  end  of  the  third  verse  of  the  second  chapter, 
are  the  work  of  two  different  persons,  I  come  to  show,  from 
the  contradictory  matters  they  contain,  that  they  cannot  be 
the  work  of  one  person,  and  are  two  different  stories. 

It  is  impossible,  unless  the  writer  was  a  lunatic,  without 
memory,  that  one  and  the  same  person  could  say,  as  i|  said 
in  the  27th  and  28th  verses  of  tne  first  chapter — "  So  God 
created  man  in  his  own  image,  in  the  image  of  God  created 
he  him  /  male  and  female  created  he  them;  and  God  blessed 
them,  and  God  said  unto  them,  be  fruitful  and  multiply,  and 
replenish  the  earth,  and  subdue  it,  ana  have  dominion  over 
the  fish  of  the  sea,  and  over  the  fowls  of  the  air,  and  every 
living  thing  that  moveth  on  the  face  of  the  earth"  It  is,  I 
say,  impossible  that  the  same  person  who  said  this,  could 
afterwards  say,  as  is  said  in  the  second  chapter,  ver.  5,  and 
there  was  not  a  man  to  till  the  ground  /  and  then  proceed  in 
the  7th  verse  to  give  another  account  of  the  making  a  man 
for  the  first  time,  and  afterwards  of  the  making  a  woman  out 
of  his  rib. 

Again,  one  and  the  same  person  could  not  write,  as  is 
written  in  the  29th  verse  of  the  first  chapter :  "  Behold  I 
(God)  have  given  you  every  herb  bearing  seed,  which  is  on 
the  face  of  the  earth ;  and  every  tree,  in  which  is  the  fruit 
of  a  tree  bearing  seed,  to  you  it  shall  be  for  meat,"  and 
afterwards  say,  as  is  said  in  the  second  chapter,  that  the  Lord- 
God  planted  a  tree  in  the  midst  of  a  garden,  and  forbad 
man  to  eat  thereof. 

Again,  one  and  the  same  persons  could  not  sav,  "  Thut 
the  neavens  and  the  earth  were  finished,  and  all  tne  host  of 


238  LFTTER   TO   5fR 

them,  and  on  the  seventh  day  Qod  ended  his  work  which  he 
had  made  /  and  shortly  after  s^t  the  Cre?*or  to  work  again, 
to  plant  a  garden,  to  make  a  man  and  «  woman,  &c.,  as  is 
done  in  the  second  chapter. 

Here  are  evidently  two  different  stories  contradicting  each 
other. — According  to  the  first,  the  two  «*xes,  the  male  and 
the  female,  were  made  at  the  same  time  According  to  the 
second,  they  were  made  at  different  time*  •  the  man  first,  the 
woman  afterwards. — According  to  the  firnt  story  they  were  to 
have  dominion  over  all  the  earth.  According  to  the  second, 
their  dominion  was  limited  to  a  garden.  How  large  a  gar- 
den it  could  be,  that  one  man  and  one  woioan  could  dress 
and  keep  in  order,  I  leave  to  the  prosecutor,  the  judge,  the 
jury,  and  Mr.  Erskine  to  determine. 

The  story  of  the  talking  serpent,  and  its  tete-a-tete  with 
Eve ;  the  doleful  adventure  called  the  Fall  of  Man  •  and 
how  he  was  turned  out  of  his  fine  garden,  a^d  how  the  gar- 
den was  afterwards  locked  up  and  guarded  by  a  flaming 
sword,  (if  any  one  can  tell  what;  a  flaming  swo^d  ii,)  belong- 
ing altogether  to  the  second  story.  They  have  TXO  connexion 
with  the  first  story.  According  to  the  first  there  was  no 
garden  of  Eden  ;  no  forbidden  tree :  the  scene  was  the  whole 
earth,  and  the  fruit  of  all  the  trees  was  allowed  to  be  eaten. 

In  giving  this  example  of  the  strange  state  of  the  Bible, 
it  cannot  be  said  I  have  gone  out  of  mv  way  to  seek  it,  for 
I  have  taken  the  beginning  of  the  book ;  nor  can  it  be  said 
I  have  made  more  of  it,  man  it  makes  itself.  That  there 
are  two  stories  is  as  visible  to  the  eye,  when  attended  to,  as 
that  there  are  two  chapters,  and  that  they  have  been  written 
by  different  persons,  nobody  knows  by  whom.  If  this  then 
is  the  strange  condition  the  beginning  of  the  Bible  is  in,  it 
leads  to  a  just  suspicion,  that  the  other  parts  are  no  better, 
and  consequently  it  becomes  every  man*s  duty  to  examine 
the  case.  I  have  done  it  for  myself,  and  am  satisfied  that 
the  Bible  IB  fabulous. 

Perhaps  I  shall  be  told  in  the  cant-language  of  the  day, 
AS  I  have  often  been  told  by  the  Bishop  of  LlandafF  and 
others,  of  the  great  and  laudable  pains  that  many  pious  and 
learned  men  have  taken  to  explain  the  obscure,  and  reconcile 
the  contradictory,  or  as  thev  say,  the  seemingly  contradictory 
passages  of  the  Bible.  It  is  because  the  Bible  needs  such  an 
undertaking,  that  is  one  of  the  first  causes  to  suspeat  it  is 
NOT  the  word  of  God ;  this  single  reflection,  when  carried 
home  to  the  mind,  is  in  itself  a  volume. 


LETTEE   TO   ME.    ERSKTNE.  489 

What !  does  not  the  Creator  of  the  Universe,  the  Fountain 
of  all  Wisdom,  the  Origin  of  all  Science,  the  Author  of  all 
knowledge,  the  God  of  Order,  and  of  Harmony,  know  how 
to  write  f  When  we  contemplate  the  vast  economy  of  the 
creation ;  when  we  behold  the  unerring  regularity  of  the 
visible  solar  system,  the  perfection  with  which  all  its  several 
parts  revolve,  and  by  corresponding  assemblage,  form  a 
whole ; — when  we  launch  our  eye  into  the  boundless  ocean 
of  space,  and  see  ourselves  surrounded  by  innumerable 
worlds,  not  one  of  which  varies  from  its  appointed  place — 
when  we  trace  the  power  of  the  Creator,  from  a  mite  to  an 
elephant — from  an  atom  to  an  universe — can  we  suppose 
that  the  mind  that  could  conceive  such  a  design,  and  the 
power  that  executed  it  with  incomparable  perfection,  cannot 
write  without  inconsistency  ;  or,  that  a  book  so  written,  can 
be  the  work  of  such  a  power  ?  The  writings  of  Thomas 
Paine,  even  of  Thomas  Paine,  need  no  commentator  to  ex- 
plain, expound,  arrange,  and  re-arrange  their  several  parts, 
to  render  them  intelligible — he  can  relate  a  fact,  or  write  an 
essay,  without  forgetting  in  one  page  what  he  has  written  in 
an  other — certainly  then,  did  the  God  of  all  perfection  con- 
descend to  write  or  dictate  a  book,  that  booK  would  be  as 
perfect  as  himself  is  perfect ;  the  Bible  is  not  so,  and  it  is 
confessedly  not  so,  by  the  attempts  to  amend  it. 

Perhaps  I  shall  be  told,  that  though  I  have  produced  one 
instance,  I  cannot  produce  another  of  equal  force.  One  ii 
sufficient  to  call  in  question  the  genuineness  of  authenticity 
of  any  book  that  pretends  to  be  the  word  of  God  ;  for  suen 
a  book  would,  as  before  said,  be  as  perfect  as  its  author  ia 
perfect.  > 

I  will,  however,  advance  only  four  chapters  further  into 
the  book  of  Genesis,  and  produce  another  example  that  is* 
sufficient  to  invalidate  the  story  to  which  it  belongs*. 

We  have  all  heard  of  Noah's  Flood  ;  and  it  is  impossible 
to  think  of  the  whole  human  race,  men,  women,  children, 
and  infants  (except  one  family,)  deliberately  drowning,  with- 
out feeling  a  painful  sensation  ;  that  heart  must  be  a  heart 
of  flint  that  can  contemplate  such  a  scene  with  tranquillity. 
There  is  nothing  in  the  ancient  mythology,  nor  in  tne  reli- 
gion of  any  people  we  know  of  upon  the  globe,  that  records 
a  sentence  of  their  God,  or  of  their  Gods,  so  tremendously 
severe  and  merciless.  If  the  story  be  not  true,  we  blasphe- 
mously dishonor  God  by  believing  it,  and  still  more  so,  in 
forcing,  by  laws  and  penalties,  that  belief  upon  others.  I  go 


240  LETTER   TO   MR.    EKSKINE. 

now  to  show,  from  the  face  of  the  story,  that  it  carries  the 
evidence  of  not  being  true. 

I  know  not  if  the  judge,  the  jury,  and  Mr.  Erskine,  who 
tried  and  convicted  Williams,  ever  read  the  Bible,  or  know 
any  thing  of  its  contents,  and,  therefore,  I  will  state  the  case 
precisely. 

There  was  no  such  people  as  Jews  or  Israelites,  in  the 
time  that  Noah  is  said  to  have  lived,  and  consequently  there 
was  no  such  law  as  that  which  is  called  the  Jewish  or  Mosaic 
Law.  It  is  according  to  the  Bible,  more  than  six  hundred 
years  from  the  time  the  flood  is  said  to  have  happened,  to 
the  time  of  Moses,  and  consequently  the  time  the  flood  is 
said  to  have  happened,  was  more  than  six  hundred  years 
prior  to  the  law,  called  the  law  of  Moses,  even  admitting 
Moses  to  have  been  the  giver  of  that  law,  of  which  there  is 
great  cause  to  doubt. 

We  have  here  two  different  epochs,  or  points  of  time ;  that 
of  the  flood,  and  that  of  the  law  of  Moses ;  the  former  more 
than  six  hundred  years  prior  to  the  latter.  But  the  maker 
of  the  story  of  the  flood,  whoever  he  was,  has  betrayed  him- 
self by  blundering,  for  he  has  reversed  the  order  of  the  times. 
He  has  told  the  story,  as  if  the  law  of  Moses  was  prior  to  the 
flood ;  for  he  has  made  God  to  say  to  Noah,  Genesis,  chap, 
vii.  ver.  2,  "  Of  every  clean  beast,  thou  shalt  take  unto  thee 
by  sevens,  male  and  his  female,  and  of  beasts  that  are  not 
clean  by  two,  the  male  and  his  female."  This  is  the  Mosaic 
law,  and  could  only  be  said  after  that  law  was  given,  not 
before.  There  was  no  such  things  as  beasts  clean  and  un- 
clean in  the  time  of  Noah — It  is  nowhere  said  they  were 
created  so. — They  were  only  declared  to  be  so,  as  meats,  by 
the  Mosaic  law,  and  that  to  the  Jews  only,  and  there 
was  no  such  people  as  Jews  in  the  time  of  Noah.  This 
is  the  blundering  condition  in  which  this  strange  story 
stands. 

When  we  reflect  on  a  sentence  so  tremendously  severe,  as 
that  of  consigning  the  whole  human  race,  eight  persons  ex- 
cepted,  to  deliberate  drowning ;  a  sentence,  which  represents 
the  Creator  in  a  more  merciless  character  than  any  of  those 
whom  we  call  Pagans,  ever  represented  the  Creator  to  be, 
under  the  figure  01  any  of  their  deities,  we  ought  at  least  to 
suspend  our  belief  of  it,  on  a  comparison  of  the  benefi  j;3nt 
character  of  the  Creator,  with  the  tremendous  severity  of  the 
sentence ;  but  when  we  see  the  story  told  with  such  an 
evident  contradiction  of  circumstances,  we  ought  to  set  it 


LETTER   TO   MR.    ER8KTNE.  241 

down  for  nothing  better  than  a  Jewish  fable,  told  by  nobody 
knows  whom,  and  nobody  knows  when. 

It  is  a  relief  to  the  genuine  and  sensible  soul  of  man  to 
find  the  story  unfounded.  It  frees  us  from  two  painful  sen- 
sations at  once ;  that  of  having  hard  thoughts  of  the  Crea- 
tor, on  account  of  the  severity  of  the  sentence ;  and  that  of 
sympathising  in  the  horrid  tragedy  of  a  drowning  world. 
He  who  cannot  feel  the  force  of  what  I  mean,  is  not,  in  my 
estimation  of  character,  worthy  the  name  of  a  human  being. 

I  have  just  said  there  is  great  cause  to  doubt,  if  the  law, 
called  the  law  of  Moses,  was  given  by  Moses ;  the  books 
called  the  books  of  Moses,  which  contain,  among  other 
things,  what  is  called  the  Mosaic  law,  are  put  in  front  of  the 
Bible,  in  the  manner  of  a  constitution,  with  a  history  an- 
nexed to  it.  Had  these  books  been  written  by  Moses,  they 
would  undoubtedly  have  been  the  oldest  books  in  the  Bible, 
and  entitled  to  be  placed  first,  and  the  law  and  the  history 
they  contain,  would  be  frequently  referred  to  in  the  books 
that  follow ;  but  this  is  not  the  case.  From  the  time  of 
Othniel,  the  first  of  the  judges,  (Judges,  chap.  iii.  ver.  9.)  to 
the  end  of  the  book  of  Judges,  which  contains  a  period  of 
four  hundred  and  ten  years,  this  law,  and  those  books,  were 
not  in  practice,  nor  known  among  the  Jews,  nor  are  they  so 
much  as  alluded  to  throughout  the  whole  of  that  period. 
And  if  the  reader  will  examine  the  22d  and  23d  chapters  of 
the  3d  book  of  Kings,  and  34th  chapter  2d  Chron.  he  will 
find  that  no  such  law,  nor  any  such  books  were  known  in 
the  time  of  the  Jewish  monarchy,  and  that  the  Jews  were 
Paeans  during  the  whole  of  that  time,  and  of  their  judges. 

The  first  time  the  law,  called  the  law  of  Moses,  made  its 
appearance,  was  in  the  time  of  Josiah,  about  a  thousand 
years  after  Moses  was  dead :  it  is  then  said  to  have  been 
found  by  accident.  The  account  of  this  finding,  or  pretended 
finding,  is  given  2d  Chron.  chap,  xxxiv.  ver.  14,  15,  16,  18 : 
"  Hilkiah  the  priest  found  the  book  of  the  law  of  the  Lord, 
given  by  Moses,  and  Hilkiah  answered  and  said  to  Shaphan 
the  scribe,  I  have  found  the  book  of  the  law  in  the  house  of 
the  Lord,  and  Hilkiah  delivered  the  book  to  Shaphan,  and 
Shaphan  carried  the  book  to  the  king,  and  Shaphan  told  the 
king,  (Josiah,)  saying,  Hilkiah  the  priest  hath  given  me  a 
book." 

In  consequence  of  this  finding,  which  much  resembles  that 
of  poor  Chatterton  finding  manuscript  poems  of  Rowley,  the 
monk,  in  the  cathedral  church  at  Bristol,  or  the  late  finding 

11 


242  LETTER   TO   MR.    ERSKOTE. 

of  manuscripts  of  Shakspeare  in  an  old  chest,  (two  well 
known  frauds,)  Josiah  abolished  the  Pagan  religion  of  tha 
Jews,  massacred  all  the  Pagan  priests,  though  he  himself 
had  been,  a  Pagan,  as  the  reader  will  see  in  the  23d  chap. 
2d  Kings,  and  thus  established  in  blood,  the  law  that  is  there 
called  the  law  of  Moses,  and  instituted  a  passover  in  com- 
memoration thereof.     The  22d  verse,  speaking  of  this  pass- 
over,  says,  "  Surely  there  was  not  held  such  a  passover  from 
the  days  of  the  judges,  that  judged  Israel,  nor  in  all  the 
days  of  the  kings  of  Israel,  nor  the  kings  of  Judah ;"  and 
the  25th  ver.  in  speaking  of  this  priest-killing  Josiah,  says, 
"  Like  unto  Mm,  there  was  no  king  before  him,  that  turned 
to  the  Lord  with  all  his  heart,  and  with  all  his  soul,  and 
with  all  his  might,  according  to  all  the  law  of  Moses  ;  nei- 
ther after  him  arose  there  any  like  him"    This  verse,  like  the 
former  one,  is  a  general  declaration  against  all  the  preceding 
kings  without  exception.     It  is  also  a  declaration  against  all 
that  reigned  after  him,  of  which  there  were  four,  the  whole 
time  of  whose  reigning  makes  but  twenty-two  years  and  six 
months,  before  the  Jews  were  entirely  broken  up  as  a  nation 
and  their  monarchy  destroyed.     It  is,  therefore,  evident  that 
the  law,  called  the  law  of  Moses,  of  which  the  Jews  talk  so 
much,  was  promulgated  and  established  only  in  the  latter 
time  of  the  Jewish  monarchy ;  and  it  is  very  remarkable, 
that  no  sooner  had  they  established  it  than  they  were  a  de- 
stroyed people,  as  if  they  were  punished  for  acting  an  im- 
position and  affixing  the  name  of  the  Lord  to  it,  and  massa- 
cring their  former  priests  under  the  pretence  of  religion. 
The  sum  of  the  history  of  the  Jews  is  this — they  continued 
to  be  a  nation  about  a  thousand  years,  they  then  established 
a  law,  which  they  called  the  law  of  the  Lord  given  oy  Mo- 
ses, and  were  destroyed.     This  is  not  opinion,  but  historical 
evidence. 

Levi,  the  Jew,  who  has  written  an  answer  to  the  Age  of 
Reason,  gives  a  strange  account  of  the  law  called  the  law 
of  Moses. 

In  speaking  of  the  storv  of  the  sun  and  moon  standing 
still,  that  the  Israelites  might  cut  the  throats  of  all  their  en- 
emies, and  hang  all  their  kings,  as  told  in  Joshua,  chap,  x., 
he  says,  "  There  is  also  another  proof  of  the  reality  of  this 
miracle,  which  is,  the  appeal  that  the  author  of  the  book  of 
Joshua  makes  to  the  book  of  Jasher,  '  Is  not  this  written  in 
the  look  of  Jasher  T  Hence,"  continues  Levi,  "  It  is  mani- 
fest that  the  book  commonly  called  tb  <3  book  of  Jasher,  ex 


LETTER   TO   MR.    ER8KIN1B  '243 

isted,  and  was  well  known  at  the  time  the  book  of  Joshua 
was  written ;  and  pray,  Sir,"  continues  Levi,  "  what  book  do 
you  think  this  was  ?  why,  no  other  than  the  law  of  Moses  /" 
Levi,  like  the  Bishop  of  Llandaff,  and  many  other  guess-work 
commentators,  either  forgets  or  does  not  know,  what  there  ia 
in  one  part  of  the  Bible,  when  he  is  giving  his  opinion  upon 
another  part. 

I  did  not,  however,  expect  to  find  so  much  ignorance  in  a 
Jew,  with  respect  to  the  history  of  his  nation,  though  I 
might  not  be  surprised  at  it  in  a  "bishop.  If  Levi  will  look 
into  the  account  given  in  the  first  chap.  2d  book  of  Sam. 
of  the  Amalekite  slaying  Saul,  and  bringing  the  crown  and 
bracelets  to  David,  he  will  find  the  following  recital,  ver. 
15,  17,  18  :  "  And  David  called  one'of  the  young  men,  and 
said,  go  near  and  fall  upon  him,  (the  Amalekite,)  and  he 
smote  him  that  he  died :  and  David  lamented  with  this 
lamentation  over  Saul  and  over  Jonathan  his  son ;  also  he 
bade  them  teach  the  children  the  use  of  the  bow ; — behold 
it  is  written  in  the  took  of  Jasher"  If  the  book  of  Jasher 
were  what  Levi  calls  it,  tne  law  of  Moses,  written  bv  Moses, 
it  is  not  possible  that  any  thing  that  David  saia  or  did 
could  be  written  in  that  law,  since  Moses  died  more  than 
five  hundred  years  before  David  was  born ;  and,  on  the 
other  hand,  admitting  the  book  of  Jasher  to  be  the  law 
called  the  law  of  Moses  ;  that  law  must  have  been  written 
more  than  five  hundred  years  after  Moses  was  dead,  or  it 
could  not  relate  anv  thing  said  or  done  by  David.  Levi 
may  take  which  of  these  cases  he  pleases,  for  both  are 
against  him. 

I  am  not  going  in  the  course  of  this  letter  to  write  a  com- 
mentary on  the  Bible.  The  two  instances  I  have  produced, 
and  which  are  taken  from  the  beginning  of  the  Bible,  show 
the  necessity  of  examining  it.  It  is  a  book  that  has  been 
read  more,  and  examined  less,  than  any  book  that  ever  ex- 
isted. Had  it  come  to  us  an  Arabic  or  Chinese  book,  and 
said  to  have  been  a  sacred  book  by  the  people  from  whom 
it  came,  no  apology  would  have  been  made  for  the  confused 
and  disorderly  state  it  is  in.  The  tales  it  relates  of  the 
Creator  would  have  been  censured,  and  our  pity  excited  for 
those  who  believed  them.  We  should  have  vindicated  the 
goodness  of  God  against  such  a  book,  and  preached  up  the 
disbelief  of  it  out  of  reverence  to  him.  Why  then  oo  we 
not  act  as  honourably  by  the  Creator  in  the  one  case  as  we 
do  in  the  other.  As  a  Chinese  book  we  would  have  ex 


244  LETTER   TO   ME.   ERSZINTC. 

amined  it ; — ou^ht  we  not  then  to  examine  it  as  a  Jewish 
book  ?  The  Chinese  are  a  peop1^  who  have  all  the  appear- 
ance of  far  greater  antiquity  than  the  Jews ;  and  in  point 
of  permanency,  there  is  no  comparison.  They  are  also  a 
people  of  mild  manners  and  good  morals,  except  where  they 
have  been  corrupted  by  European  commerce.  Tet  we  take 
the  word  of  a  restless,  bloody-minded  people,  as  the  Jews 
of  Palestine  were,  when  we  would  reject  the  same  authority 
from  a  better  people.  We  ought  to  see  it  is  habit  and 

Srejudice  that  have  prevented  people  from  examining  the 
ible.  Those  of  the  church  of  England  call  it  holy,  because 
the  Jews  called  it  so,  and  because  custom  and  certain  acts 
of  parliament  call  it  so,  and  they  read  it  from  custom.  Dis- 
senters read  it  for  the  purpose  of  doctrinal  controversy,  and 
are  very  fertile  in  discoveries  and  inventions.  But  none  of 
them  read  it  for  the  pure  purpose  of  information,  and  of 
rendering  justice  to  the  Creator,  by  examining  if  the  evi- 
dence it  contains  warrants  the  belief  of  its  being  what  it 
is  called.  Instead  of  doing  this,  they  take  it  blindfolded, 
and  will  have  it  to  be  the  word  of  God  whether  it  be  so  or 
not.  For  my  own  part,  my  belief  in  the  perfection  of  the 
Deity  will  not  permit  me  to  believe,  that  a  book  so  mani- 
festly obscure,  disorderly,  and  contradictory,  can  be  his 
work.  I  can  write  a  better  book  myself.  This  disbelief  in 
me  proceeds  from  my  belief  in  the  Creator.  I  cannot  pin 
my  faith  upon  the  say  so  of  Hilkiah,  the  priest,  who  said  he 
found  it,  or  any  part  of  it,  nor  upon  Shaphan  the  scribe, 
nor  upon  any  priests,  nor  any  scribe  or  man  of  the  law  of 
the  present  day. 

As  to  acts  of  parliament,  there  are  some  that  say  there 
are  witches  and  wizards ;  and  the  persons  who  made  those 
acts,  (it  was  in  the  time  of  James  the  First,)  made  also  some 
acts  which  call  the  Bible  the  Holy  Scriptures,  or  "Word  of 
God.  But  acts  of  parliament  decide  nothing  with  respect 
to  God  ;  and  as  these  acts  of  parliament  making  were  wrong 
with  respect  to  witches  and  wizards,  they  may  also  be  wrong 
with  respect  to  the  book  in  question.*  It  is,  therefore, 

*  It  is  afflicting  to  humanity  to  reflect  that,  after  the  blood  shed  to  estab- 
lish the  divinity  of  the  Jewish  scriptures,  it  should  have  become  necessary 
to  grant  a  new  dispensation,  which,  through  unbelief  and  conflicting  opin- 
ions respecting  its  true  construction,  has  cost  as  great  or  greater  sacrifices 
than  the  former.  Catholics,  when  they  had  the  ascendency,  burnt  Protes- 
tants, who,  in  turn,  led  Catholics  to  the  state,  and  both  united  in  extermi- 
nating Dissenters.  The  Dissenters,  when  they  had  the  power,  pursued  the 
Eume  course.  The  diabolical  act  of  Calvin,  in  the  burning  of  Dr.  Servetus,  is 


LETTER   TO  ME.    ERSKINE.  245 

I 

necessary  that  the  book  be  examined  ;  it  is  our  duty  to  ex 
amine  it ;  and  to  suppress  the  rig^ht  of  examination  is  sinfui 
in  any  government,  or  in  any  judge  or  jury.  The  Bible 

an  awful  witness  of  this  fact.  Servetus  suffered  two  hours  in  a  slow  fire  be- 
fore life  was  extinct.  The  Dissenters,  who  escaped  from  England,  had  scarcely 
seated  themselves  in  the  wilds  of  America,  before  they  began  to  exterminate 
from  the  territory  they  had  seized  upon,  all  those  who  did  not  profess  what 
they  called  the  orthodox  faith.  Priests,  Quakers,  and  Adamites,  were  pro- 
hibited from  entering  the  territory,  on  pain  of  death.  By  priests,  they  meant 
clergymen  of  the  Roman  Catholic,  if  not  also  of  the  Protestant  or  Episcopal 
persuasion.  Their  own  priests  they  denominated  ministers.  These  puritans 
also,  particularly  in  the  province  of  Massachusetts-Bay,  put  many  persons  to 
death  on  the  charge  of  witchcraft.  There  is  no  account,  however,  of  their 
having  burned  any  alive,  as  was  done  in  Scotland,  about  the  same  period  in 
which  the  executions  took  place  in  Massachusetts-Bay.  In  England,  Sir  Mat- 
thew Hale,  a  judge  eminent  for  extraordinary  piety,  condemned  two  women  to 
death  on  the  same  charge. 

I  doubt,  however,  if  there  be  any  acts  of  the  parliament  now  in  force  for 
inflicting  pains  and  penalties  for  denying  the  scriptures  to  be  the  word  of 
God,  as  our  upright  judges  seem  to  rely  at  this  time  wholly  upon  what  they 
call  the  common  law,  to  justify  the  horrid  persecutions  which  are  now  carried 
on  in  England,  to  the  disgrace  of  a  country  that  boasts  so  much  of  its  tolerant 
spirit. 

As  the  common  law  is  derived  from  the  customs  of  our  ancestors,  when  in 
a  rude  and  barbarous  condition,  it  is  not  surprising  that  many  of  its  injunc- 
tions should  be  opposed  to  the  ideas,  which  a  society  in  a  civilized  and  refined 
state,  should  deem  compatible  with  justice  and  right.  Accordingly  we  find 
that  government  has  from  time  to  time  annulled  some  of  its  most  prominent 
absurdities ;  such  as  the  trials  by  ordeal,  the  wager  of  battle  in  case  of  appeal 
for  murder,  under  a  belief  that  a  supernatural  power  would  interfere  to  save 
the  innocent  and  destroy  the  guilty  in  such  a  combat,  &c.  Yet  much  remains 
nearly  as  ridiculous,  that  requires  a  further  and  more  liberal  use  of  the  prun- 
ing knife. 

"  In  the  days  of  the  Stuarts,  [A.  D.  1670,  22d  year  of  Charles  II.  See  the 
Republican,  vol.  5,  p.  22.]  William  Penn  was  indicted  at  Common  Law  for  a 
riot  and  breach  of  the  peace  on  having  delivered  his  sentiments  to  a  congrega- 
tion of  people  in  Grace-church-street :  he  told  the  judge  and  the  jury  that 
Common  Law  was  an  abuse,  and  no  law  at  all ;  and  in  spite  of  the  threats,  the 
fines  and  imprisonments  inflicted  on  his  jury,  they  acquitted  him  on  this  plea. 
William  Penn  found  an  honest  jury." 

The  introduction,  however,  of  Christianity,  as  composing  a  part  of  this  Com* 
mon  Law,  ^bad  as  much  of  it  is,)  is  proved  to  be  a  fraud  or  misconception  of 
the  old  Norman  French  ;  as  I  shall  show  by  an  extract  of  a  letter  from  Thomas 
Jefferson  to  Major  Cartwright,  bearing  date  5th  June,  1824. 

For  a  more  full  development  of  this  subject,  see  Sampson's  Anniversary 
Discourse,  before  the  Historical  Society  of  New-York.  EDITOR. 

Extract  from  Jefferson's  Letter. 

"  I  am  glad  to  find  in  your  book  [The  English  Constitution,  produced  and 
illustrated]  a  formal  contradiction,  at  length,  of  the  judiciary  usurpation  of 
legislative  power ;  for  such  the  judges  have  usurped  in  their  repeated  deci- 
sions, that  Christianity  is  a  part  of  the  common  law.  The  proof  of  the  con- 
trary, which  you  have  adduced,  is  incontrovertible :  to  wit,  that  the  common 
law  existed  while  the  Anglo-Saxons  were  yet  Pagans ;  at  a  time  when  they  had 
never  yet  hoard  the  name  of  Christ  pronounced,  or  knew  that  such  a  character 


24:6  LETTER   TO   HE.    KRSKINE. 

makes  God  to  say  to  Moses,  Deut.  chap.  vii.  ver.  2,  "  And 
when  the  Lord  thy  God  shall  deliver  them  before  thee,  thou 
shalt  smite  them,  and  utterly  destroy  them,  thou  shalt  make 

had  ever  existed.  But  it  may  amuse  you  to  show  when,  and  by  what  means, 
they  stole  this  law  in  upon  us.  In  a  case  of  Quare  Impedit.  in  the  Year  Book, 
84  Henry  VI.  fo.  28,  [Anno  1458,]  a  question  was  made  how  far  the  ecclesi- 
astical law  was  to  be  respected  in  a  common  law  court.  And  Prisot,  Chief 
Justice,  gave  his  opinion  in  these  words  : — '  A  tiel  ieis,  que  Us  de  saint  eglise 
ont  en  ancien  scripture,  covient  a  nous  a  donner  credence :  cal  ceo  Commen 
Ley  sur  quels  touts  manners  Ieis  sent  foddes.  Et  auxy,  Sir,  nous  sumus 
obliges  de  conustre  lour  ley  de  saint  eglise  :  et  semblablement  Us  sont  obliges 
de  conustre  nostre  ley — Et,  Sir,  si  poit  apperer  or  a  nous  que  1'evesque  adfait 
come  un  ordinary  fera  en  tiel  cas,  adong  nous  devons  ceo  adjuger  bon,  ou 
auterment  nemy,'  "  &c.  ["  To  such  laws  as  they  of  holy  church  have  in  an- , 
cient  writing,  it  behoves  us  to  give  credence :  for  it  is  that  common  law  upon 
which  all  kinds  of  law  are  founded ;  and  therefore,  Sir,  are  we  bound  to  know 
their  law  of  holy  church,  and  in  like  manner  are  they  obliged  to  know  our 
laws.  And,  Sir,  if  it  should  appear  now  to  us,  that  the  bishop  had  done  what 
an  ordinary  ought  to  do  in  like  case,  then  we  should  adjudge  it  good,  and  not 
otherwise."] — The  canons  of  the  church  anciently  were  incorporated  with  the 
laws  of  the  land,  and  of  the  same  authority.  See  Dr.  Henry's  Hist.  G.  Britain. 

EDITOR. 

See  S.  C.  Fitzh.  abr.  qu.  imp.  89.  Bro.  abr.  qu.  imp.  12.  Finch  in  his  1st 
Book,  c.  3,  is  the  first  afterwards  who  quotes  the  case,  and  mis-states  it  thus  : 
"  '  To  such  laws  of  the  church  as  have  warrant  in  Holy  Scripture,  our  law 
giveth  credence,'  and  cites  Prisot ;  mistranslating  '  ancient  Scripture '  into 
'  holy  Scripture ;'  whereas  Prisot  palpably  says,  '  to  such  laws  as  those  of  holy 
church  have  in  ancient  writing,  it  is  proper  for  us  to  give  credence  ;'  to  wit — 
to  their  ancient  written  laws.  This  was  hi  1613,  a  century  and  a  half  after  the 
dictum  of  Prisot. — Wingate,  in  1658,  erects  this  false  translation  into  a  maxim 
of  the  common  law,  copying  the  words  of  Finch,  but  citing  Prisot.  Wingate, 
max.  3,  and  Sheppard,  title  'Religion,'  in  1675,  copies  the  same  mistranslation, 
quoting  the  Y.  B.  Finch  and  Wingate.  Hale  expresses  it  in  these  words : 
*  Christianity  is  parcel  of  the  law  of  England'— 1  Ventris  293.  3  Keb.  607,  but 
quotes  no  authority.  By  these  echoings  and  re-echoings  from  one  to  another, 
it  had  become  so  established  in  1728,  that  in  the  case  of  the  King  vs.  Wool- 
ston,  2  Stra.  834,  the  court  would  not  suffer  it  to  be  debated,  whether  to  write 
against  Christianity  was  punishable  in  the  temporal  court  at  common  lav. 
Wood,  therefore,  409,  ventures  still  to  vary  the  phrase,  and  say,  'that  a1.1 
blasphemy  and  profaneness  are  offences  by  the  common  law  ;'  and  cites  2  Stra. 
— Then  Blackstone,  in  1763,  iv.  69,  repeats  the  words  of  Hale,  that  '  Ch^is^ 
ianity  is  part  of  the  law  of  England,'  citing  Ventris  and  Strange.  And  finally, 
Lord  Mansfield,  with  a  little  qualification,  in  Evans'  case  in  1767,  says,  that 
'the  essential  principles  of  revealed  religion  are  part  of  the  common  law' — 
thus  ingulfing  Bible,  Testament,  and  all  into  the  common  law,  without  citing 
any  authority.  And  thus  we  find  this  chain  of  authorities  hanging,  link  by 
link,  one  upon  another,  and  all  ultimately  on  one  and  the  same  hook,  and  that 
a  mistranslation  of  the  words,  '  ancient  scripture?  used  by  Prisot.  Finch 
quotes  Prisot ;  Wingate  does  the  same  ;  Sheppard  quotes  Prisot,  Finch  and 
Wingate.  Hale  cites  nobody.  The  court,  on  Woolston's  case,  cites  Hale ; 
Wood  cites  Woolston's  case  ;  Blackstone  quotes  Woolston's  case  and  Hale; 
and  Lord  Mansfield,  like  Hale,  ventures  it  on  his  own  authority.  Here  I  might 
defy  the  best  read  lawyer  to  produce  another  scrip  of  authority  for  this  judi- 
ciary forgery ;  and  I  might  go  on  farther  to  show  how  some  of  the  Anglo- 
Saxon  priests  interpolated  in'.o  the  text  of  Alfred's  laws  the  20th,  21st,  22d, 


LETTER   TO   MR     ER8KINE.  247 

no  covenant  with  them,  nor  sJiow  mercy  unto  them  "  Not 
all  the  priests,  nor  scribes,  nor  tribunals  in  the  world,  nor 
all  the  authority  of  man,  shall  make  me  believe  that  God 
ever  gave  such  a  Robespierrean precept  as  that  of  showing  no 
mercy  ;  and  consequently  it  is  impossible  that  I,  or  any  per- 
son who  believes  as  reverentially  of  the  Creator  as  I  do,  can 
believe  such  a  boot  to  be  the  word  of  God. 

There  have  beer.,  and  still  are,  those,  who,  whilst  they 
profess  to  believe  the  Bible  to  be  the  word  of  God,  affect  to 
turn  it  into  ridicule.  Taking  their  profession  and  conduct 
together,  they  act  blasphemously ;  because  they  act  as  if 
God  himself  was  not  to  be  believed.  The  case  is  exceed- 
ingly different  with  respect  to  the  Age  of  Reason.  That 
book  is  written  to  show  from  the  Bible  itself,  that  there  is 
abundant  matter  to  suspect  it  is  not  the  word  of  God,  and 
that  we  have  been  imposed  upon,  first  by  Jews,  and  after- 
wards by  priests  and  commentators. 

Not  one  of  those  who  have  attempted  to  write  answers  to 
the  Age  of  Reason,  have  taken  the  ground  upon  which  only 
an  answer  could  be  written.  The  case  in  question  is  not 
upon  any  point  of  doctrine,  but  altogether  upon  a  matter  of 
fact.  Is  the  book  called  the  Bible  the  word  of  God,  or  is  it 
not  ?  If  it  can  be  proved  to  be  so,  it  ought  to  be  believed 
as  such ;  if  not,  it  ought  not  to  be  believed  as  such.  This  is 
the  true  state  of  the  case.  The  Age  of  Reason  produces  evi- 
dence to  show,  and  I  have  in  this  letter  produced  additional 
evidence  that  it  is  not  the  word  of  God.  Those  who  take  the 
contrary  side,  should  prove  that  it  is.  But  this  they  have 
not  done,  nor  attempted  to  do,  and  consequently  they  have 
done  nothing  to  the  purpose. 

The  prosecutors  of  Williams  have  shrunk  from  the  point, 
as  the  answerers  have  done.  They  have  availed  themselves  of 
prejudice  instead  of  proof.  If  a  writing  was  produced  in  a 
court  of  judicature,  said  to  be  the  writing  of  a  certain  per- 
son, and  upon  the  reality  or  non-reality  of  which,  some  mat- 
ter at  issue  depended,  the  point  to  be  proved  would  be,  that 
such  writing  was  the  writing  of  such  person.  Or  if  the  issue 
depended  upon  certain  words,  which  some  certain  person 
was  said  to  nave  spoken,  the  point  to  be  proved  would  be, 
that  such  words  were  spoken  by  such  person  ;  and  Mr.  Er- 
ekine  would  contend  the  case  upon  this  ground.  A  certain 

and  23d  chapters  of  Exodus,  and  the  15th  of  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles,  from 
the  23d  to  the  29th  verse*  ;  but  this  would  lead  my  pen,  and  your  patienor 
too  far.  What  a  conspirr  ;y  this,  between  church  and  state!"* 


248  LETTER   TO   ME.    EKSKINE. 

book  is  said  to  be  the  word  of  God.  What  is  the  proof  that 
it  is  so  ?  for  upon  this  the  whole  depends ;  and  if  it  cannot 
be  proved  to  be  so,  the  prosecution  fails  for  want  of  evi- 
dence. 

The  prosecution  against  "Williams  charges  him  with  pub- 
lishing a  book,  entitled  The  Age  of  Reason,  which  it  says, 
is  an  impious  blasphemous  pamphlet,  tending  to  ridicule  and 
bring  into  contempt  the  Holy  Scriptures.  Nothing  is  more 
easy  than  to  find  abusive  words,  and  English  prosecutions 
are  famous  for  this  species  of  vulgarity.  The  charge,  how- 
ever, is  sophistical ;  for  the  charge,  as  growing  out  of  the 
pamphlet,  should  have  stated,  not  as  it  now  states,  to  ridi- 
cule and  bring  into  contempt  the  Holy  Scriptures,  but  to 
show,  that  the  book  called  the  Holy  Scriptures  are  not  the 
Holy  Scriptures.  It  is  one  thing  if  I  ridicule  a  work  as  be- 
ing written  by  a  certain  person ;  but  it  is  quite  a  different 
thing  if  I  write  to  prove  that  such  work  was  not  written  by 
such  person.  In  the  first  case,  I  attack  the  person  through 
the  work ;  in  the  other  case,  I  defend  the  honor  of  the  per- 
son against  the  work.  This  is  what  the  Age  of  Reason  does, 
and  consequently  the  charge  in  the  indictment  is  sophisti- 
cally  stated.  Every  one  will  admit,  that  if  the  Bible  be  not 
the  word  of  God,  we  err  in  believing  it  to  be  his  word,  and 
ought  not  to  believe  it.  Certainly,  then,  the  ground  the  pro- 
secution should  take,  would  be  to  prove  that  the  Bible  is  in 
fact  what  it  is  called.  But  this  the  prosecution  has  not  done, 
and  cannot  do. 

In  all  cases  the  prior  fact  must  be  proved,  before  the  sub- 
sequent facts  can  be  admitted  in  evidence.  In  a  prosecution 
for  adultery,  the  fact  of  marriage,  which  is  the  prior  fact, 
must  be  proved,  before  the  facts  to  prove  adultery  can  be  re- 
ceived. If  the  fact  of  marriage  cannot  be  proved,  adultery 
cannot  be  proved ;  and  if  the  prosecution  cannot  prove  the 
Bible  to  be  the  word  of  God,  the  charge  of  blasphemy  is 
visionary  and  groundless. 

In  Turkey  they  might  prove,  if  the  case  happened,  that  a 
certain  book  was  bought  of  a  certain  bookseller,  and  that 
the  said  book  was  written  against  the  Koran.  In  Spain  and 
Portugal  they  might  prove,  that  a  certain  book  was  bought 
of  a  certain  bookseller,  and  that  the  said  book  was  written 
against  the  infallibility  of  the  Pope.  Under  the  ancient 
mythology  they  might  have  proved,  that  a  certain  writing 
was  bought  of  a  certain  person,  and  that  the  said  writing 
Was  written  against  the  belief  of  a  plurality  of  gods,  and  in 


LETTER  TO   ME.    ERSKOTE.  249 

the  support  of  the  belief  of  one  God.     Socrates  was  con 
demnea  for  a  work  of  this  kind. 

All  these  are  but  subsequent  facts,  and  amount  to  nothing, 
unless  the  prior  facts  be  proved.  The  prior  fact,  with  re- 
spect to  the  first  case,  is,  Is  the  Koran  the  word  of  God? 
"With  respect  to  the  second,  Is  the  infallibility  of  the  Pope  a 
truth  ?  With  respect  to  the  third,  Is  the  belief  of  a  plural- 
ity of  gods  a  true  belief?  and  in  like  manner  with  respect  to 
the  present  prosecution,  Is  the  book  called  the  Bible  the 
word  of  God  ?  If  the  present  prosecution  prove  no  more 
than  could  be  proved  in  any  or  all  of  these  cases,  it  proves 
only  as  they  do,  or  as  an  inquisition  would  prove ;  and  in 
this  view  ot  the  case,  the  prosecutors  ought  at  least  to  leave 
off  reviling  that  infernal  institution,  the  inquisition.  The 
prosecution,  however,  though  it  may  injure  the  individual, 
may  promote  the  cause  of  truth?  because  the  manner  in 
which  it  has  been  conducted,  appears  a  confession  to  the 
world,  that  there  is  no  evidence  to  prove  that  the  Bible  is 
the  word  of  God.  On  what  authority  then  do  we  believe 
the  many  strange  stories  that  the  Bible  tells  of  God. 

This  prosecution  has  been  carried  on  through  the  medium 
of  what  is  called  a  special  jury,  and  the  whole  of  a  special 
jury  is  nominated  by  the  master  of  the  crown  office.  Mr. 
Erskine  vaunts  himself  upon  the  bill  he  brought  into  parlia- 
ment with  respect  to  trials,  for  what  the  government  party 
calls  libels.  But  if  in  crown  prosecutions,  the  master  of  the 
crown  office  is  to  continue  to  appoint  the  whole  special  jury, 
which  he  does  by  nominating  the  forty-eight  persons  from 
which  the  solicitor  of  each  party  is  to  strike  out  twelve,  Mr. 
Erskine's  bill  is  only  vapour  and  smoke.  The  root  of  the 
grievance  lies  in  the  manner  of  forming  the  jury,  and  to  this 
Mr.  Erskine's  bill  applies  no  remedy. 

When  the  trial  of  Williams  came  on,  only  eleven  of  the 
special  jurymen  appeared,  and  the  trial  was  adjourned.  In 
cases  where  the  wnole  number  do  not  appear,  it  is  customary 
to  make  up  the  deficiency  by  taking  jurymen  from  persons 
present  in  court.  This,  in  the  law  term,  is  called  a  Tales. 
Why  was  not  this  done  in  this  case ?  Reason  will  suggest, 
that  they  did  not  choose  to  depend  on  a  man  accidentally 
taken.  When  the  trial  re-commenced,  the  whole  of  the 
special  jury  appeared,  and  Williams  was  convicted  j  it  is 
folly  to  contend  a  cause  where  the  whole  jury  is  nominated 
by  one  of  the  parties.  I  will  relate  a  recent  case  that  ex- 

11* 


250  LETTER   TO   ME.    EBSKOTE. 

plains  a  great  deal  with  respect  to  special  juries  in  crown 
prosecutions. 

On  the  trial  of  Lambert  and  others,  printers  and  proprie- 
tors of  the  Morning  Chronicle,  for  a  libel,  a  special  jury  was 
struck,  on  the  prayer  of  the  Attorney-General,  who  used  to 
be  called  Didbolus  Regis,  or  King's  Devil. 

Only  seven  or  eight  of  the  special  jury  appeared,  and  the 
Attorney  General  not  praying  a  Tales,  the  trial  stood  over 
to  a  future  day  ;  when  it  was  to  be  brought  on  a  second  time, 
the  Attorney  General  prayed  for  a  new  special  jury,  but  as 
this  was  not  admissible,  the  original  special  jury  was  sum- 
moned. Only  eight  of  them  appeared,  on  which  the  Attor- 
ney General  said,  "  As  I  cannot,  on  a  second  trial,  have  a 
special  jury,  I  will  pray  a  Tales,"  Four  persons  were  then 
taken  from  the  persons  present  in  court,  and  added  to  the 
eight  special  jurymen.  The  jury  went  out  at  two  o'clock  to 
consult  on  their  verdict,  and  the  judge  (Keny on)  understand- 
ing they  were  divided,  and  likely  to  be  some  time  in  making 
up  their  minds,  retired  from  the  bench,  and  went  home.  At 
seven,  the  jury  went,  attended,  by  an  officer  of  the  court,  to 
the  Judge's  house,  and  delivered  a  verdict,  "  Guilty  of  pub- 
lishing, but  with  no  malicious  intention"  The  Judge  said, 
"  /  cannot  record  this  verdict :  it  is  no  verdict  at  all.  The 
jury  withdrew,  and  after  sitting  in  consultation  till  five  in 
the  morning,  brought  in  a  verdict,  Not  Guilty.  "Would  this 
have  been  the  case,  had  they  been  all  special  jurymen  nomi- 
nated by  the  Master  of  the  Crown-office  ?  This  is  one  of  the 
cases  that  ought  to  open  the  eyes  of  people  with  respect  to 
the  manner  of  forming  special  juries. 

On  the  trial  of  Williams,  the  Judge  prevented  the  counsel 
for  the  defendant  proceeding  in  the  defence.  The  prosecu- 
tion had  selected  a  number  of  passages  from  the  Age  of 
Reason,  and  inserted  them  in  the  indictment.  The  defend- 
ing counsel  was  selecting  other  passages  to  show,  that  the 
passages  in  the  indictment  were  conclusions  drawn  from 
premises,  and  unfairly  separated  therefrom  in  the  indictment. 
The  Judge  said,  he  did  not  know  how  to  act /  meaning  there- 
by whether  to  let  the  counsel  proceed  in  the  defence  or  not, 
and  asked  the  jury  if  they  wished  to  hear  the  passages  read 
which  the  defending  counsel  had  selected  The  jury  said 
NO,  and  the  defending  counsel  was  in  consequence  silent. 
Mr.  Erskine  then,  Falstaff  like,  having  all  the  field  to  him- 
self, and  no  enemy  at  hand,  laid  about  him  most  heroically, 
<ind  the  jury  found  the  defendant  guilty.  I  know  not  if  Mr 


LBTTER  TO   ME.    EB8KHTC.  851 

ran  out  of  court  and  hallooed,  huzza  for  the  Bible 
and  the  trial  by  jury. 

Robespierre  caused  a  decree  to  be  passed  during  the  trial 
of  Brissot  and  others,  that  after  a  trial  had  lasted  three  days, 
(the  whole  of  which  time,  in  the  case  of  Brissot,  was  taken 
up  by  the  prosecuting  party,)  the  judge  should  ask  the  jury 
(who  were  then  a  packed  jury)  if  they  were  satisfied  ?  If 
the  jury  said  YES,  the  trial  ended,  and  the  jury  proceeded 
to  give  their  verdict,  without  hearing  the  defence  of  the 
accused  party.  It  needs  no  depth  of  wisdom  to  make  an 
application  of  this  case. 

I  will  now  state  a  case  to  show  that  the  trial  of  Williams 
is  not  a  trial,  according  to  Kenyon's  own  explanation  of 
Jaw. 

On  a  late  trial  in  London  (Selthens  versus  Hoossman)  on 
a  policy  of  insurance,  one  of  the  jurymen,  Mr.  Dunnage, 
after  hearing  one  side  of  the  case,  and  without  hearing  the 
other  side,  got  up  and  said,  it  was  as  legal  a  policy  of  insur- 
ance as  ever  was  written.  The  Judge,  who  was  the  same  as 
presided  on  the  trial  of  Williams,  replied,  that  it  was  a  great 
misfortune  when  any  gentleman  of  the  jury  makes  up  hi* 
mind  on  a  cause  before  it  was  finished.  Mr.  Erskine,  wno  in 
that  cause  was  counsel  for  the  defendant,  (in  this  he  was 
against  the  defendant,)  cried  out,  it  is  worse  than  a  misfor- 
tune, it  is  a  fault.  The  Judge,  in  his  address  to  the  jurv  in 
Bumming  up  the  evidence,  expatiated  upon,  and  explained 
the  parts  which  the  law  assigned  to  the  counsel  on  each  side, 
to  tne  witnesses,  and  to  the  Judge,  and  said,  "  Wlien  all  this 
was  done,  and  not  until  then,  it  was  the  business  of  the  jury 
to  declare  what  the  justice  of  the  case  was  /  and  that  it  was 
extremely  rash  and  imprudent  in  any  man  to  draw  a  conclu- 
sion before  all  the  premises  were  laid  before  them,  upon  which 
that  conclusion  was  to  he  grounded.  According  then  to 
Kenyon's  own  doctrine,  the  trial  of  Williams  is  an  irregular 
trial,  the  verdict  an  irregular  verdict,  and  as  such  is  not 
recordable. 

As  to  special  juries,  they  are  but  modern ;  and  were  insti- 
tuted for  the  purpose  of  determining  cases  at  law  between 
merchants ;  because,  as  the  method  of  keeping  merchants' 
accounts  differs  from  that  of  common  tradesmen,  and  their 
business,  by  lying  much  in  foreign  bills  of  exchange,  insur- 
ance, &c.,  is  of  a  different  description  to  that  of  commoi 
tradesmen,  it  might  happen  that  a  common  jury  might  D  '; 
be  competent  to  form  a  judgment.  The  law  that  mstituf  •! 


252  USTTEK   TO   MR.    ER6KINE. 

special  juries,  makes  it  necessary  that  the  jurors  be  mer- 
chants, or  of  the  degree  of  squires.  A  special  jury  in  Lon- 
don is  generally  composed  ofmerchants ;  and  in  the  country, 
of  men  called  country  squires,  that  is,  fox-hunters,  or  men 
qualified  to  hunt  foxes.  The  one  may  decide  very  well  upon 
a  case  of  pounds,  shillings,  and  pence,  or  of  the  counting- 
house:  and  the  other  of  the  jockey-club  or  the  chase.  But 
who  would  not  laugh,  that  because  such  men  can  decide  such 
cases,  they  can  also  be  jurors  upon  theology.  Talk  with 
some  London  merchants  about  scripture,  and  they  will 
understand  you  mean  scrip,  and  tell  you  how  much  it  is 
worth  at  the  Stock  Exchange.  Ask  them  about  theology, 
and  they  will  say  they  know  of  no  such  gentleman  upon 
Change.  Tell  some  country  squires  of  the  sun  and  moon 
standing  still,  the  one  on  the  top  of  a  hill  and  the  other  in  a 
valley,  and  they  will  swear  it  is  a  lie  of  one's  own  making. 
Tell  them  that  God  Almighty  ordered  a  man  to  make  a  cake 
and  bake  it  with  a  t — d  and  eat  it,  and  they  will  say  it  is 
one  of  Dean  Swift's  blackguard  stories.  Tell  them  it  is  in 
the  Bible,  and  they  will  lay  a  bowl  of  punch  it  is  not,  and 
leave  it  to  the  parson  of  the  parish  to  decide.  Ask  them  also 
about  theology,  and  they  will  say,  they  know  of  no  such  an 
one  on  the  turf.  An  appeal  to  such  juries  serves  to  bring 
the  Bible  into  more  ridicule  than  anything  the  author  of 
the  Age  of  Reason  has  written ;  and  the  manner  in  which 
the  trial  has  been  conducted  shows,  that  the  prosecutor  dares 
not  come  to  the  point,  nor  meet  the  defence  of  the  defendant. 
But  all  other  cases  apart,  on  what  ground  of  right,  other- 
wise than  on  the  right  assumed  by  an  inquisition,  do  such 
prosecutions  stand?  Religion  is  a  private  affair  between 
every  man  and  his  Maker,  and  no  tribunal  or  third  party  has 
a  right  to  interfere  between  them.  It  is  not  properly  a  thing 
of  this  world ;  it  is  only  practised  in  this  world ;  but  its 
object  is  in  a  future  world ;  and  it  is  no  otherwise  an  object 
of  just  laws,  than  for  the  purpose  of  protecting  the  equal 
rights  of  all,  however  various  their  beliefs  may  be.  If  one  man 
choose  to  believe  the  book  called  the  Bible  to  be  the  word  of 
God,  and  another,  from  the  convinced  idea  of  the  purity  and 
perfection  of  God,  compared  with  the  contradictions  the  book 
contains — from  the  lasciviousness  of  some  of  its  stories,  like 
that  of  Lot  getting  drunk  and  debauching  his  two  daughters, 
which  is  not  spoken  of  as  a  crime,  and  for  which  the  most 
absurd  apologies  are  made — from  the  immorality  of  some  of 
its  precepts,  nke  that  of  showing  no  mercy — and  from  the 


LETTER   TO   MB.    ER8KIKE.  258 

total  want  of  evidence  on  the  case,  thinks  he  ought  not  to 
believe  it  to  be  the  word  of  God,  each  of  them  has  an  equal 
right ;  and  if  the  one  has  the  right  to  give  his  reasons  for 
believing  it  to  be  so,  the  other  has  an  equal  right  to  give  hia 
reasons  for  believing  the  contrary.  Any  thing  that  goes 
beyond  this  rule  is  an  inquisition.  Mr.  Erskine  talks  of  his 
moral  education ;  Mr.  Erskine  is  very  little  acquainted  with 
theological  subjects,  if  he  does  not  know  there  is  such  a 
thing  as  a  sincere  and  religious  belief  that  the  Bible  is  not 
the  word  of  God.  This  is  my  belief;  it  is  the  belief  of 
thousands  far  more  learned  than  Mr.  Erskine ;  and  it  is  a 
belief  that  is  every  day  increasing.  It  is  not  infidelity,  as  Mr. 
Erskine  profanely  and  abusively  calls  it;  it  is  the  direct 
reverse  ot  infidelity.  It  is  a  poor  religious  belief,  founded 
on  the  idea  of  the  perfection  of  the  Creator.  If  the  Bible 
be  the  word  of  God,  it  needs  not  the  wretched  aid  of  prose- 
cutions to  support  it ;  and  you  might  with  as  much  propriety, 
make  a  law  to  protect  the  sunshine,  as  to  protect  the  Bible, 
if  the  Bible,  like  the  sun,  be  the  work  of  God.  We  see  that 
God  takes  good  care  of  the  Creation  he  has  made.  He  suffers 
no  part  of  it  to  be  extinguished :  and  he  will  take  the  same  care 
of  his  word,tf  he  ever  ga/ue  one.  But  men  ought  to  be  reveren- 
tially careful  and  suspicious  how  they  ascribe  books  to  him 
as  his  word,  which  from  this  confused  condition  would  dis- 
honor a  common  scribbler,  and  against  which  there  is  abun- 
dant evidence,  and  every  cause  to  suspect  imposition.  Leave 
then  the  Bible  to  itself.  God  will  take  care  of  it  if  he  has 
anything  to  do  with  it,  as  he  takes  care  of  the  sun  and  the 
moon,  which  need  not  your  laws  for  their  better  protection. 
As  the  two  instances  I  have  produced,  in  the  beginning  of 
this  letter,  from  the  book  of  Genesis,  the  one  respecting  the 
account  called  the  Mosaic  account  of  the  Creation,  the  other 
of  the  Flood,  sufficiently  show  the  necessity  of  examining 
the  Bible,  in  order  to  ascertain  what  degree  of  evidence 
there  is  for  receiving  or  rejecting  it  as  a  sacred  book  ; 
I  shall  not  add  more  upon  that  subject ;  but  in  order 
to  show  Mr.  Erskine  that  there  are  religious  establish- 
ments for  public  worship  which  make  no  profession  of 
faith  of  the  books  called  holy  scriptures,  nor  admit  of 
priests,  I  will  conclude  with  an  account  of  a  society  late- 
ly began  in  Paris,  and  now  very  rapidly  extending  itself. 
The  society  takes  the  name  01  Theopnilantropes,  which 
would  be  rendered  in  English  by  the  word  Theophilan- 
thropiste,  compounded  of  three  Greek  words,  signifying 


254:  LETTER   TO   MB.    EBSKOffE. 

God,  Love,  and  Man.  The  explanation  given  to  this  word 
is,  Lovers  of  God  and  Man,  or  Adorers  of  God  and  Friends 
of  Man,  adorateurs  de  Dieu  et  amis  des  homines.  The  so- 
ciety proposes  to  publish  each  year  a  volume,  the  first 
volume  is  just  published,  entitled 


RELIGIOUS  YEAR  OF  THE  THEOPHILANTHROPISTS; 

OK, 

ADORERS  07  GOD,  AND  FRIENDS  0V  MAN. 

Being  a  collection  of  the  discourses,  lectures,  hymns,  and 
canticles,  for  all  the  religious  and  moral  festivals  of  the 
Theophilanthropists  during  the  course  of  the  year,  whether 
in  their  public  temples  or  in  their  private  families,  pub- 
lished by  the  author  of  the  Manual  of  the  Theophilanthro- 
pists. 

The  volume  of  this  year,  which  is  the  first,  contains  214 
pages  duodecimo. 

The  following  is  the  table  of  contents : — 

1.  Precise  history  of  the  Theophilanthropists. 

2.  Exercises  common  to  all  the  festivals. 

3.  Hymn,  No.  I,  God  of  whom  the  universe  speaks. 
4r.  Discourse  upon  the  existence  of  God. 

5.  Ode  II.     The  heavens  instruct  the  earth. 

6.  Precepts  of  wisdom,  extracted  from  the  book  of  the  Ado- 

rateurs. 

7.  Canticle,  No.  in.     God  Creator,  soul  of  nature. 

8.  Extracts  from  divers  moralists,  upon  the  nature  of  God, 

and  upon  the  physical  proofs  of  his  existence. 

9.  Canticle,  No.  IY7    Let  us  bless  at  our  waking  the  God 

who  gives  us  light. 

10.  Moral  thoughts  extracted  from  the  Bible. 

11.  Hymn,  No.  Y.     Father  of  the  universe. 

12.  Contemplation  of  nature  on  the  first  days  of  the  spring. 

13.  Ode,  No.  YI.     Lord  in  thy  glory  adorable. 

14:.  Extracts  from  the  moral  thoughts  of  Confucius. 

15.  Canticle  in  praise  of  actions,  and  thanks  for  the  works  of 

the  creation. 

16.  Continuation  from  the  moral  thoughts  of  Confucius. 

17.  Hymn,  No.  YII.     All  the  universe  is  full  of  thy  magni- 

ficence. 

18.  Extracts  from  an  ancient  sage  of  India  upon  the  duties 

of  families. 


LETTER   TO   MB,    EBSKOTB.  255 

19.  Upon  the  spring. 

20.  Moral  thoughts  of  divers  Chinese  authors. 

21.  Canticle,  No.  YIH.    Every  thing  celebrates  the  glory 

of  the  eternal. 

22.  Continuation  of  the  moral  thoughts  of  Chinese  authors. 

23.  Invocation  for  the  country. 

24.  Extracts  from  the  moral  thoughts  of  Theognis. 

25.  Invocation,  Creator  of  man. 

26.  Ode,  No.  IX.    Upon  Death. 

27.  Extracts  from  the  book  of  the  Moral  Universal,  upon 

happiness. 

28.  Ode,  No.  X.     Supreme  Author  of  Nature. 

INTKODUCTION. 

BHTITLSD 

PRECISE  HISTORY  OF  THE  THEOPHILANTHROPISTS. 

"  TOWAEDS  the  month  of  Vendimiaire,  of  the  year  5,  (Sept. 
1796,)  there  appeared  at  Paris,  a  small  work,  entitled, 
Manual  of  the  Theoanthropophiles,  since  called,  for  the  sake 
of  easier  pronunciation,  Tneophilantropes,  (Theophilanthro- 
pists,)  published  by  C— • — . 

"  The  worship  set  forth  in  this  Manual,  of  which  the  origin 
is  from  the  beginning  of  the  world,  was  then  professed  oy 
some  families  in  the  silence  of  domestic  life.  But  no  sooner 
was  the  Manual  published,  that  some  persons,  respectable 
for  their  knowledge  and  their  manners,  saw,  in  the  forma- 
tion of  a  society  open  to  the  public,  an  easy  method  of 
spreading  moral  religion,  and  of  leading  by  degrees  great 
numbers  to  the  knowledge  thereof,  who  appear  to  have  for- 
gotten it.  This  consideration  ought  of  itself  not  to  leave  in- 
different those  persons  who  know  that  morality  and  religion, 
which  is  the  most  solid  support  thereof,  are  necessary  to  the 
maintenance  of  society,  as  well  as  to  the  happiness  of  the 
individual.  These  considerations  determined  the  families 
of  the  Theophilanthropists  to  unite  publicly  for  the  exercise 
of  their  worship. 

"  The  first  society  of  this  kind  opened  in  the  month  of 
Nivose,  year  5,  (Jan.  1797,)  in  the  street  Dennis,  No.  34, 
corner  of  Lombard-street.  The  care  of  conducting  this 
society  was  undertaken  by  five  fathers  of  families.  They 
adopted  the  Manual  of  the  Theophilanthropists.  They 
ugreed  to  hold  their  days  of  public  worship  on  the  days  cor- 


1S56  LETTER   TO   MR.    ERSKINB. 

responding  to  Sundays,  but  without  making  this  a  hindrance 
to  other  societies  to  choose  such  other  day  as  they  thought 
more  convenient.  Soon  after  this,  more  societies  wero 
opened,  of  which  some  celebrate  on  the  decadi,  (tenth  day,) 
and  others  on  the  Sunday:  it  was  also  resolved  that  the 
committee  should  meet  one  hour  each  week  for  the  purpose 
of  preparing  or  examining  the  discourses  and  lectures  pro- 
posed for  the  next  general  assembly.  That  the  general 
assemblies  should  be  called  Fetes  (festivals)  religious  and 
moral.  That  those  festivals  should  be  conducted  in  princi- 
ple and  form,  in  a  manner,  as  not  to  be  considered  as  the 
festivals  of  an  exclusive  worship ;  and  that  in  recalling  those 
who  might  not  be  attached  to  any  particular  worship,  those 
festivals  might  also  be  attended  as  moral  exercises  by  disci- 
ples of  everv  sect,  and  consequently  avoid,  by  scrupulous 
care,  every  thing  that  might  make  the  society  appear  under 
the  name  of  a  sect.  The  society  adopts  neither  rights  nor 
priesthood,  and  it  will  never  lose  sight  of  the  resolution 
not  to  advance  any  thing  as  a  society,  inconvenient  to  any 
sect  or>  sects,  in  any  time  or  country,  and  under  any  govern- 
ment. 

"  It  will  be  seen,  that  it  is  so  much  the  more  easy  for  the 
society  to  keep  within  this  circle,  because,  that  the  dogmas 
of  the  Theophilanthropists  are  those  upon  which  all  the  sects 
have  agreed,  that  their  moral  is  that  upon  which  there  has 
never  been  the  least  dissent ;  and  that  the  name  they  have 
taken,  expresses  the  double  end  of  all  the  sects,  that  of  lead- 
ing to  the  adoration  of  God  and  love  of  man. 

"  The  Theophilanthropists  do  not  call  themselves  the  dis- 
ciples of  such  or  such  a  man.  They  avail  themselves  of  the 
wise  precepts  that  have  been  transmitted  by  writers  of  all 
countries  and  in  all  ages.  The  reader  will  find  in  the  dis- 
courses, lectures,  hymns,  and  canticles,  which  the  Theophi- 
lanthropists have  adopted  for  their  religious  and  moral  festi- 
vals, and  which  they  present  under  the  title  of  Annee  Ke- 
ligieuse,  extracts  from  moralists,  ancient  and  modern, 
divested  of  maxims  too  severe,  or  too  loosely  conceived, 
or  contrary  to  piety,  whether  towards  God  or  towards 
man." 

Next  follow  the  dogmas  of  the  Theophilanthropists,  or 
things  they  profess  to  believe.  These  are  but  two,  and  are 
thus  expressed,  les  Theophilantropes  croient  a  ^existence  de 
Dieu,  et  a  V immortality  de  Vame.  The  Theophilanthropiste 


LETTER   TO   MR.    ER8KIWK.  257 

believe  in  the  existence  of  God,  and  the  immortality  of  the 
eoul. 

The  Manual  of  the  Theophilanthropists,  a  small  volume  of 
sixty  pages,  duodecimo ,  is  published  separately,  as  is  also 
their  catechism,  which  is  of  the  same  size.  The  principles 
of  the  Theophilanthropists  are  the  same  as  those  published 
in  the  first  part  of  the  Age  of  Reason  in  1793,  and  in  the 
second  part,  in  1795.  The  Theophilanthropists,  as  a  society, 
are  silent  upon  all  the  things  they  do  not  profess  to  believe, 
as  the  sacredness  of  the  books  called  the  Bible,  &c.  &c. 
They  profess  the  immortality  of  the  soul,  but  they  are  silent 
on  the  immortality  of  the  body,  or  that  which  the  church 
calls  the  resurrection.  The  autnor  of  the  Age  of  Reason 
gives  reasons  for  every  thing  he  disbelieves,  as  well  as  for 
those  he  believes;  ana  where  this  cannot  be  done  with 
safety,  the  government  is  a  despotism,  and  the  church  an 
inquisition. 

It  is  more  than  three  years  since  the  first  part  of  the  Age 
of  Reason  was  published,  and  more  than  a  year  and  a  half 
since  the  publication  of  the  second  part :  the  bishop  of  Llan 
daff  undertook  to  write  an  answer  to  the  second  part ;  and 
it  was  not  until  after  it  was  known  that  the  author  of  the 
Age  of  Reason  would  reply  to  the  bishop,  that  the  prosecu- 
tion against  the  book  was  set  on  foot ;  and  which  is  said  to 
be  carried  on  by  some  clergy  of  the  English  church.  If  the 
bishop  is  one  of  them,  and  the  object  be  to  prevent  an  ex- 
posure of  the  numerous  and  gross  errors  he  has  committed 
in  his  work,  (and  which  he  wrote  when  report  said  that 
Thomas  Paine  was  dead,)  it  is  a  confession  that  he  feels  the 
weakness  of  his  cause,  and  finds  himself  unable  to  maintain 
it.  In  this  case  he  has  given  me  a  triumph  I  did  not  seek, 
and  Mr.  Erskine,  the  herald  of  the  prosecution,  has  pro- 
claimed it. 

THOMAS  PAINH. 


AN  ESSAY  ON  DREAMS. 


As  a  great  deal  is  said  in  the  New  Testament  about 
dreams,  it  is  first  necessary  to  explain  the  nature  of  a  dream, 
and  to  show  by  what  operation  of  the  mind  a  dream  is  pro- 
duced during  sleep.  When  this  is  understood  we  shall  be 
better  enabled  to  judge  whether  any  reliance  can  be  placed 
upon  them ;  and,  consequently,  whether  the  several  mat- 
ters in  the  New  Testament  related  of  dreams  deserve  the 
credit  which  the  writers  of  that  book  and  priests  and  com- 
mentators ascribe  to  them. 

In  order  to  understand  the  nature  of  dreams,  or  of  that 
which  passes  in  ideal  vision  during  a  state  of  sleep,  it  is  first 
necessary  to  understand  the  composition  and  decomposition 
of  the  human  mind. 

The  three  great  faculties  of  the  mind  are  IMAGINATION, 
JUDGMENT  and  MEMORY.  Every  action  of  the  mind  comes 
under  one  or  the  other  of  these  faculties.  In  a  state  of 
wakefulness,  as  in  the  day-time,  these  three  faculties  are  all 
active ;  but  that  is  seldom  the  case  in  sleep,  and  never  per- 
fectly :  and  this  is  the  cause  that  our  dreams  are  not  so  reg- 
ular and  rational  as  our  waking  thoughts. 

The  seat  of  that  collection  of  powers  or  faculties,  that  con- 
stitute what  is  called  the  mind,  is  in  the  brain.  There  is 
not,  and  cannot  be,  any  visible  demonstration  of  this  ana- 
tomically, but  accidents  happening  to  living  persons,  show 
it  to  be  so.  An  injury  done  to  the  brain  by  a  fracture  of  the 
skull,  will  sometimes  change  a  wise  man  into  a  childish  idiot : 
a  being  without  a  mind.  But  so  careful  has  nature  been  of 
that  sanctum  sanctorum  of  man,  the  brain,  that  of  all  the 
external  accidents  to  which  humanity  is  subject,  this  happens 
the  most  seldom.  But  we  often  see  it  happening  by  long 
and  habitual  intemperance. 

Whether  those  three  faculties  occupy  distinct  apartments 
of  the  brain,  is  known  only  to  that  Almighty  power  that 
formed  and  organized  it.  We  can  see  the  external  effects 
of  muscular  motion  in  all  the  members  of  the  body,  though 
its  primum  mobile,  or  first  moving  cause,  is  unknown  to 

886 


AN    ESSAY   ON   DREAMS.  259 

man.  Our  external  motions  are  sometimes  the  effect  of  in- 
tention, and  sometimes  not.  If  we  are  sitting  and  intend  to 
rise,  or  standing  and  intend  to  set,  or  to  walk,  the  limbs 
obey  that  intention  as  if  they  heard  the  order  given.  But 
we  make  a  thousand  motions  every  day,  and  that  as  well 
waking  as  sleeping,  that  have  no  prior  intention  to  direct 
them.  Each  memoer  acts  as  if  it  had  a  will  or  mind  of  its 
own.  Man  governs  the  whole  when  he  pleases  to  govern, 
but  in  the  interims  the  several  parts,  like  little  suburbs,  gov- 
ern themselves  without  consulting  the  sovereign. 

But  all  these  motions,  whatever  be  the  generating  cause, 
are  external  and  visible.  But  with  respect  to  the  brain,  no 
ocular  observation  can  be  made  upon  it.  All  is  mystery ; 
all  is  darkness  in  that  womb  of  thought. 

Whether  the  brain  is  a  mass  of  matter  in  continual  rest ; 
whether  it  has  a  vibrating  pulsative  motion,  or  a  heaving  and 
falling  motion,  like  matter  in  fermentation  ;  whether  differ- 
ent parts  of  the  brain  have  different  motions  according  to  the 
faculty  that  is  employed,  be  it  the  imagination,  the  judgment, 
or  the  memory,  man  knows  nothing  of  it.  He  knows  not 
the  cause  of  his  own  wit.  His  own  brais.  conceals  it  from  him. 

Comparing  invisible  by  visible  things,  as  metaphysical  can 
sometimes  be  compared  to  physical  things,  ths  operations  of 
those  distinct  and  several  faculties  have  some  resemblance 
to  the  mechanism  of  a  watch.  The  main  spring  whl?h  puts 
all  in  motion,  corresponds  to  the  imagination :  the  pendu- 
lum or  balance,  which  corrects  and  regulates  that  motion, 
corresponds  to  the  judgment :  and  the  hand  and  dial,  like 
the  memory,  records  the  operations. 

Now  in  proportion  as  these  several  faculties  sleep,  slum- 
ber, or  keep  awake,  during  the  continuance  of  a  dream,  in 
that  proportion  the  dream  will  be  reasonable  or  frantic,  re- 
membered or  forgotten. 

If  there  is  any  faculty  in  mental  man  that  never  sleeps,  it 
is  that  volatile  thing  the  imagination  :  the  case  is  different 
with  the  judgment  and  memory.  The  sedate  and  sober  con- 
stitution of  the  judgment  easily  disposes  it  to  rest ;  and  as 
to  the  memory,  it  records  in  silence,  and  is  active  only  when 
it  is  called  upon. 

That  the  judgment  soon  goes  to  sleep  may  be  perceived  by 
our  sometimes  beginning  to  dream  before  we  are  fully  asleep 
ourselves.  Some  random  thought  runs  in  the  mind,  and  we 
start,  as  it  were,  into  recollection  that  we  are  dreaming  be- 
tween sleeping  and  waking. 


260  AN    ESSAY    ON    DREAMS. 

If  the  judgment  sleeps  whilst  the  imagination  keeps 
awake,  the  dream  will  be  a  riotous  assemblage  of  mis-shapen 
images  and  ranting  ideas,  and  the  more  active  the  imagina- 
tion is,  the  wilder  the  dream  will  be.  The  most  inconsistent 
and  the  most  impossible  things  will  appear  right ;  because 
that  faculty,  whose  province  it  is  to  keep  order,  is  in  a  state 
of  absence.  The  master  of  the  school  is  gone  out,  and  the 
boys  are  in  an  uproar. 

If  the  memory  sleeps,  we  shall  have  no  other  knowledge 
of  the  dream  than  that  we  have  dreamt,  without  knowing 
what  it  was  about.  In  this  case  it  is  sensation,  rather  than 
recollection,  that  acts.  The  dream  has  given  us  some  sense 
of  pain  or  trouble,  and  we  feel  it  as  a  hurt,  rather  than 
remember  it  as  a  vision. 

If  memory  only  slumbers,  we  shall  have  a  faint  remem- 
brance of  the  dream,  and  after  a  few  minutes  it  will  some- 
times happen  that  the  principal  passages  of  the  dream  wiP 
occur  to  us  more  fully.  The  cause  of  this  is,  that  the 
memory  will  sometimes  continue  slumbering  or  sleeping 
after  we  are  awake  ourselves,  and  that  so  fully,  that  it  may, 
and  sometimes  does  happen  that  we  do  not  immediately 
recollect  where  we  are,  nor  what  we  have  been  about,  or 
have  to  do.  But  when  the  memory  starts  into  wakefulness, 
it  brings  the  knowledge  of  these  things  back  upon  us,  like  a 
flood  of  light,  and  sometimes  the  dream  with  it. 

But  the  most  curious  circumstances  of  the  mind  in  a  state 
of  dream,  is  the  power  it  has  to  become  the  agent  of  every 
person,  character  and  thing,  of  which  it  dreams.  It  carries 
on  conversation  with  several,  asks  questions,  hears  answers, 
gives  and  receives  information,  and  it  acts  all  these  parts 
itself. 

But  however  various  and  eccentric  the  imagination  may 
be  in  the  creation  of  images  and  ideas,  it  cannot  supply  the 
place  of  memory,  with  respect  to  things  that  are  forgotten 
when  we  are  awake.  For  example,  if  we  have  forgotten  the 
name  of  a  person,  and  dream  of  seeing  him  and  asking  him 
his  name,  he  cannot  tell  it ;  for  it  is  ourselves  asking  our- 
selves the  question. 

But  though  the  imagination  cannot  supply  the  place  of 
real  memory,  it  has  the  wild  faculty  of  counterfeiting 
memory.  It  dreams  of  persons  it  never  knew,  and  talks  with 
them  as  if  it  remembered  them  as  old  acquaintances.  It 
relates  circumstances  that  never  happened,  and  tells  them 
as  if  they  had  happened.  It  goes  to  places  that  never  ex- 


AN   ESSAY   ON   DREAMS.  261 

iated,  and  knows  where  all  the  streets  and  houses  are,  as  if  it 
had  been  there  before.  The  scenes  it  creates  often  appear  as 
scenes  remembered.  It  will  sometimes  act  a  dream  within 
a  dream,  and,  in  the  delusion  of  dreaming,  tell  a  dream  it 
never  dreamed,  and  tell  it  as  if  it  was  from  memory.  It  may 
also  be  remarked,  that  the  imagination  in  a  dream,  has  no 
idea  of  time,  as  time.  It  counts  only  by  circumstances  ;  and 
if  a  succession  of  circumstances  pass  in  a  dream  that  would 
require  a  great  length  of  time  to  accomplish  them,  it  will 
appear  to  the  dreamer  that  a  length  of  time  equal  thereto 
has  passed  also. 

As  this  is  the  state  of  the  mind  in  dream,  it  may  rationally 
be  said  that  every  person  is  mad  once  in  twenty-four  hours, 
for  were  he  to  act  in  the  day  as  he  dreams  in  the  night,  he 
would  be  confined  for  a  lunatic.  In  a  state  of  wakemlness, 
those  three  faculties  being  all  alive,  and  acting  in  union, 
constitute  the  rational  man.  In  dreams  it  is  otherwise,  and, 
therefore,  that  state  which  is  called  insanity,  appears  to  be 
no  other  than  a  disunion  of  those  faculties,  and  a  cessation 
of  the  judgment  during  wakefulness,  that  we  so  often  ex- 
perience during  sleep ;  and  idiotcy,  into  which  some  per- 
sons have  fallen,  is  that  cessation  of  all  the  faculties  of  which 
we  can  be  sensible  when  we  happen  to  wake  before  our 
memory. 

In  this  view  of  the  mind  how  absurd  it  is  to  place  reli- 
ance upon  dreams,  and  how  much  more  absurd  to  make 
them  a  foundation  for  religion ;  yet  the  belief  that  Jesus 
Christ  is  the  Son  of  God,  begotten  by  the  Holy  Ghost,  a  be- 
ing never  heard  of  before,  stands  on  the  story  of  an  old 
man's  dream.  "  And  behold  the  angel  of  the  Lord  appeared 
to  Joseph  in  a  dream,  saying,  Joseph,  thou  son  of  David^fear 
not  thou  to  take  unto'  thee  Mary  thy  wife,  for  that  which  is 
conceived  in  her  is  of  the  Holy  Ghost" — Matt.  chap.  i.  verse 
20. 

After  this  we  have  the  childish  stories  of  three  or  four 
other  dreams  ?  about  Joseph  going  into  Egypt ;  about  his 
coming  back  again ;  about  this,  and  about  that,  and  this 
story  of  dreams  has  thrown  Europe  into  a  dream  for  more 
than  a  thousand  years.  All  the  efforts  that  nature,  reason, 
and  conscience  have  made  to  awaken  man  from  it,  have 
been  ascribed  by  priestcraft  and  superstition  to  the  workings 
of  the  devil,  and  had  it  not  been  for  the  American  revolu- 
lution,  which,  by  establishing  the  universal  right  of  con- 
science, first  opened  the  way  to  free  discussion,  and  for  the 


262  AN   ESSAY   ON    DREAMS. 

French  revolution  which  followed,  this  religion  of  dreams 
had  continued  to  be  preached,  and  that  after  it  had  ceased 
to  be  believed.  Those  who  preached  it  and  did  not  believe 
it,  still  believed  the  delusion  necessary.  They  were  not  bold 
enough  to  be  honest,  nor  honest  enough  to  be  bold. 

[Every  new  religion,  like  a  new  play,  requires  a  new  ap- 
paratus of  dresses  and  machinery,  to  fit  the  new  characters 
it  creates.  The  story  of  Christ  in  the  New  Testament  brings 
a  new  being  upon  the  stage,  which  it  calls  the  Holy  Ghost ; 
and  the  story  of  Abraham,  the  father  of  the  Jews,  in  the 
Old  Testament,gives  existence  to  a  new  order  of  beings  it 
calls  Angels. — There  was  no  Holy  Ghost  before  the  time  of 
Christ,  nor  Angels  before  the  time  of  Abraham. — We  hear 
nothing  of  the?e  winged  gentlemen,  till  more  than  two 
thousand  years,,  according  to  the  Bible  chronology,  from  the 
time  they  say  the  heavens,  the  earth,  and  all  therein  were 
made : — After  this,  they  hop  about  as  thick  as  birds  in  a 
grove ; — The  first  we  hear  or,  pays  his  addresses  to  Hagar  in 
the  wilderness ;  then  three  of  them  visit  Sarah ;  another 
wrestles  a  fall  with  Jacob ;  and  these  birds  of  passage  hav- 
ing found  their  way  to  earth  and  back,  are  co^.mally 
coming  and  going.  They  eat  and  drinlf ,  and  up  again  to 
heaven. — What  they  dp  with  the  food  they  carry  away, 
the  Bible  does  not  tell  us. — Perhaps  they  do  as  the  birds 
do.  *  * 

One  would  think  that  a  system  loaded  with  such  gross 
and  vulgar  absurdities  as  scripture  religion  is,  could  never 
have  obtained  credit ;  yet  we  have  seen  what  priestcraft  and 
fanaticism  could  do,  and  credulity  believe. 

From  angels  in  the  old  Testament  we  get  to  prophets,  to 
witches,  to  seers  of  visions,  and  dreamers  of  dreams,  and 
sometimes  we  are  told,  as  in  1  Sam.  chap.  ix.  ver.  15,  that 
God  whispers  in  the  ear — At  other  times  we  are  not  told 
how  the  impulse  was  given,  or  whether  sleeping  or  waking 
— In  2  Sam.  chap.  xxiv.  ver.  1,  it  is  said,  "  And  again  the 
anger  of  the  Lord  was  kindled  against  Israel,  and  he  moved 
David  against  them  to  say.  Go,  number  Israel  andJudah" — 
And  in  1  Chro.  chap.  xxi.  ver.  1,  when  the  same  story  is 
again  related,  it  is  said,  "  and  Satan  stood  up  against  Israel, 
and  moved  David  to  number  Israel." 

Whether  this  was  done  sleeping  or  waking,  we  are  not 
told,  but  it  seems  that  David,  whom  they  call  "  a  man  after 
God's  own  heart,"  did  not  know  by  what  spirit  he  was 
inoved  •  and  as  to  the  men  called  inspired  penmen,  they 


AN    ESSAY   ON    DEEAMS.  263 

agree  so  well  about  the  matter,  that  in  one  book  they  say 
that  it  was  God,  and  in  the  other  that  it  was  the  Devil. 

The  idea  that  writers  of  the  Old  Testament  had  of  God 
was  boisterous,  contemptible,  and  vulgar. — They  make  him 
the  Mars  of  the  Jews,  the  fighting  God  of  Israel,  the  conjur- 
ing God  of  their  Priests  and  Prophets. — They  tell  as  many 
fables  of  him  as  the  Greeks  told  of  Hercules.  *  *  *  * 

They  make  their  God  to  say  exultingly,  "  Twill  get  me 
honour  upon  Pharaoh  and  upon  his  Host,  upon  his  Chariots 
and  upon  his  Horsemen" — And  that  he  may  keep  his  word, 
they  make  him  set  a  trap  in  the  Red  Sea,  in  the  dead  of  the 
nignt,  for  Pharaoh,  his  host,  and  his  horses,  and  drown  them 
as  a  rat-catcher  would  do  so  many  rats — Great  honour  in- 
deed !  the  story  of  Jack  the  giant-lmler  is  better  told  1 

They  pit  him  against  the  Egyptian  magicians  to  conjure 
with  him,  the  three  first  essays  are  a  dead  match — Each 
party  turns  his  rod  into  a  serpent,  the  rivers  into  blood,  and 
creates  frogs ;  but  upon  the  fourth,  the  God  of  the  Israelites 
obtains  the  laurel,  he  covers  them  all  over  with  lice ! — The 
Egyptian  magicians  cannot  do  the  same,  and  this  lousy 
triumph  proclaims  the  victory ! 

They  make  their  God  to  rain  fire  and  brimstone  upon 
Sodom  and  Gomorrah,  and  belch  fire  and  smoke  upon  mount 
Sinai,  as  if  he  was  the  Pluto  of  the  lower  regions.  They 
make  him  salt  up  Lot'«  ^riff*  like  pickled  pork ;  they  make 
\JTS  pass  like  Shakspeare's  Queen  Mab  into  the  brain  of  their 
pnests,  prophets,  and  prophetesses,  and  tickle  them  in. 
dreams,  and  after  making  him  play  all  kind  of  tricks  they 
confound  him  with  Satan,  and  leave  us  at  a  loss  to  know 
what  God  they  meant ! 

This  is  the  descriptive  God  of  the  Old  Testament ;  and  as 
to  the  New,  though  the  authors  of  it  have  varied  the  scene, 
they  have  continued  the  vulgarity. 

Is  man  ever  to  be  the  dupe  of  priestcraft,  the  slave  of 
superstition  ?  Is  he  never  to  nave  just  ideas  of  his  Creator  ? 
It  is  better  not  to  believe  there  is  a  God,  than  to  believe  of 
him  falsely.  When  we  behold  the  mighty  universe  that 
surrounds  us,  and  dart  our  contemplation  into  the  eternity 
of  space,  filled  with  innumerable  orbs,  revolving  in  eternal 
harmony,  how  paltry  must  the  tales  of  the  Old  and  New 
Testaments,  profanely  called  the  word  of  God,  appear  to 
thoughtful  man !  The  stupendous  wisdom  and  unerring 
order,  that  reign  and  govern  throughout  this  wondrous 
whole,  and  call  us  to  reflection,  put  to  shame  the  Bible  / — 


264:  LETTER   TO   A   FEIEND. 

The  God  of  eternity  and  of  all  that  is  real,  is  not  the  God  of 
passing  dreams,  and  shadows  of  man's  imagination  !  The 
God  of  truth  is  not  the  God  of  fable ;  the  belief  of  a  God 

begotten  and  a  God  crucified,  is  a  God  blasphemed It  is 

making  a  profane  use  of  reason.]* 

I  shall  conclude  this  Essay  on  Dreams  with  the  two  first 
verses  of  the  34th  chapter  of  Ecclesiasticus,  one  of  the  books 
of  the  Apocrypha. 

"  The  hopes  of  a  man  void  of  understanding  are  vain  and 
false  •  and  dreams  lift  up  fools —  Whoso  regardeth  dreams  is 
like  him  that  catcheth  at  a  shadow,  and followeth  after  the 
wind" 


A  LETTER 

BEING  AN  ANSWER  TO  A  FRIEND  ON  THE  PUBLICATION  OP 

THE  AGE  OF  KEASCXN. 


PARIS,  May  12,  1797. 

IN  your  letter  of  the  20th  of  March,  you  gave  me  several 
quotations  from  the  Bible,  which  you  call  the  word  of  God, 
to  show  rns  that  my  opinions  on  religion  are  wrong,  and  I 
could  gjve  you  as  many,  from  the  same  book,  to  show  that 
yours  are  not  right ;  consequently,  then,  the  Bible  decides 
nothing,  because  it  decides  any  way,  and  every  way,  one 
chooses  to  make  it. 

But  by  what  authority  do  you  call  the  Bible  the  word  of 
God  f  for  this  is  the  first  point  to  be  settled.  It  is  not  your 
calling  it  so  that  makes  it  so.  any  more  than  the  Mahometans 
calling  the  Koran  the  word  of  "God  makes  the  Koran  to  be 
so.  The  Popish  Councils  of  Nice  and  Laodicea,  about  350 

*  Mr.  Paine  must  have  been  in  an  ill  humour  when  he  wrote  the  passage 
inclosed  in  crotchets,  commencing  at  page  262  ;  and  probably  on  reviewing  it, 
and  discovering  exceptionable  clauses,  was  induced  to  reject  the  whole,  as  it 
does  not  appear  in  the  edition  published  by  himself.  But  having  obtained  the 
original  in  the  hand  writing  of  Mr.  P.  and  deeming  some  of  the  remark* 
worthy  of  being  preserved,  I  have  thought  proper  to  restore  the  passage,  with 
the  exception  of  the  objectionaJ  le  parts. — EDITOR. 


LETTER  TO  A  FRIEND.  265 


years  after  the  n*\e  that  the  person  called  Jesus  Christ  ia 
said  to  have  lived,  voted  the  books,  that  now  compose  what 
is  called  the  New  Testament,  to  be  the  word  of  God.  Thia 
was  done  by  yeas  and  nays,  as  we  now  vote  a  law.  The 
Pharisees  of  the  second  l"emple,  after  the  Jews  returned 
from  captivity  in  Babylon,  did  the  same  by  the  books  that 
now  compose  the  Old  Testament,  and  this  is  all  the  autho- 
rity there  is,  which  to  me  is  no  authority  at  all.  I  am  as 
capable  of  judging  for  myself  as  they  were,  and  I  think 
more  so,  because,  as  they  made  a  living  by  their  religion, 
they  had  a  self-interest  in  the  vote  they  gave. 

You  may  have  an  opinion  that  a  man  is  inspired,  but  you 
cannpt  prove  it,  nor  can  you  have  any  proof  of  it  yourself, 
because  you  cannot  see  into  his  mind  in  order  to  know  how 
he  comes  by  his  thoughts,  and  the  same  is  the  case  with  the 
word  revelation.  —  There  can  be  no  evidence  of  such  a  thing, 
for  you  can  no  more  prove  revelation,  than  you  can  prove 
what  another  man  dreams  of,  neither  can  he  prove  it  himself. 

It  is  often  said  in  the  Bible  that  God  spake  unto  Moses, 
but  how  do  you  know  that  God  spake  unto  Moses  2  Because, 
you  will  say,  the  Bible  says  so.  The  Koran  says,  that  God 
spake  unto  Mahomet  ;  do  you  believe  that  too  2  No.  Why 
not  2  Because,  you  will  say,  you  do  not  believe  it  ;  and  so 
because  you  do,  and  because  you  don?t^  is  all  the  reason  you 
can  give  for  believing  or  disbelieving,  except  you  will  say 
that  Mahomet  was  an  impostor.  And  how  do  you  know 
Moses  was  not  an  impostor  2  For  my  own  part,  I  believe 
that  all  are  impostors  who  pretqnd  to  hold  verbal  communi 
cation  with  the  Deity.  It  is  the  way  by  which  the  world 
has  been  imposed  upon  ;  but  if  you  think  otherwise  you 
have  the  same  right  to  your  opinion  that  I  have  to  mine,  and 
must  answer  for  it  in  the  same  manner.  But  all  this  does 
not  settle  the  point,  whether  the  Bible  be  the  word  of  Oody 
or  not.  It  is,  therefore,  necessary  to  go  a  step  further.  The 
case  then  is  :  — 

You  form  your  opinion  of  God  from  the  account  given  of 
him  in  the  Bible  ;  and  I  form  my  opinion  of  the  Bible  from 
the  wisdom  and  goodness  of  God,  manifested  in  the  struc- 
ture of  the  universe,  and  in  all  the  works  of  the  Creation. 
The  result  in  these  two  cases  will  be,  that  you,  by  taking 
the  Bible  for  your  standard,  will  have  a  bad  opinion  of  God  : 
and  I,  by  taking  God  for  my  standard,  shall  have  a  bad 
opinion  of  the  Bible. 

The  Bible  represents  God  to  be  a  changeable,  passionate 


LETTER   TO    A   FRIEND. 


vindictive  being ;  making  a  world,  and  then  drowning  it, 
afterwards  repenting  of  what  he  had  done,  and  promising 
not  to  do  so  again.  Setting  one  nation  to  cut  the  throats  of 
another,  and  stopping  the  course  of  the  sun  till  the  butchery 
should  be  done.  But  the  works  of  God,  in  the  Creation, 
preach  to  us  another  doctrine.  In  that  vast  volume  we 
see  nothing  to  give  us  the  idea  of  a  changeable,  passionate, 
vindictive  God ;  every  thing  we  there  behold  impresses  us 
with  a  contrary  idea;  that  of  unchangeableness  and  of 
eternal  order,  harmony,  and  goodness.  The  sun  and  the 
seasons  return  at  their  appointed  time,  and  every  thing  in 
the  Creation  proclaims  that  God  is  unchangeable.  Now, 
which  am  I  to  believe,  a  book  that  any  impostor  may  make, 
and  call  the  word  of  God,  or  the  Creation  itself  which  none 
but  an  Almighty  Power  could  make  ?  for  the  Bible  says  one 
thing,  and  the  Creation  says  the  contrary.  The  Bible  repre- 
sents God  with  all  the  passions  of  a  mortal,  and  the  Creation 
proclaims  him  with  all  the  attributes  of  a  God. 

It  is  from  the  Bible  that  man  has  learned  cruelty,  rapine, 
and  murder ;  for  the  belief  of  a  cruel  God  makes  a  cruel 
man.  That  blood-thirsty  man,  called  the  prophet  Samuel, 
makes  God  to  say,  (1  Sam.  chap.  xv.  ver.  3,)  "Now  go  and 
smite  Ams"  '  "nd  utterly  destroy  all  that  they  have,  and 
spare  them  not,  but  slay  both  man  and  woman,  infant  and 
suckling,  ox  and  sheep,  camel  and  ass." 

xhat  Samuel,  or  some  other  impostor,  might  say  this,  is 
what,  at  this  distance  of  time,  can  neither  be  proved  nor 
disproved,  but,  in  my  opinion,  it  is  blasphemy  to  say,  or  to 
believe,  that  God  said  it.  All  our  ideas  of  the  justice  and 
goodness  of  God  revolt  at  the  impious  cruelty  01  the  Bible. 
It  is  not  a  God,  just  and  good,  but  a  devil,  under  the  name 
of  God,  that  the  Bible  describes. 

What  makes  this  pretended  order  to  destroy  the  Amale- 
kites  appear  the  worse,  is  the.  reason  given  for  it.  The 
Amalekites,  four  hundred  years  before,  according  to  the  ac- 
count in  Exodus,  chap.  17,  (but  which  has  the  appearance' 
of  fable  from  the  magical  account  it  gives  of  Moses  holding 
up  his  hands,)  had  opposed  the  Israelites  coming  into  their 
country,  and  this  the  Amalekites  had  a  right  to  do,  because 
the  Israelites  were  the  invaders,  as  the  Spaniards  were  the 
invaders  of  Mexico ;  and  this  opposition  by  the  Amalekites, 
at  that  time,  is  given  as  a  reason,  that  the  men,  women,  in- 
fants and  sucklings,  sheep  and  oxen,  camels  and  asses,  that 
•were  born  four  hundred  years  afterwards,  should  be  put  to 


LETTER  TO    A    FRIEND.  267 

death;  and  to  complete  the  horror,  Samuel  he  wed  Agag,  the 
chief  of  the  Amalekites,  in  pieces,  as  you  would  hew  a  stick 
of  wood.  I  will  bestow  a  few  observations  on  this  case. 

In  the  first  place,  nobody  knows  who  the  author,  or  wri- 
ter, of  the  book  of  Samuel  was,  and,  therefore,  the  fact  it- 
self has  no  other  proof  than  anonymous  or  hearsay  evidence, 
which  is  no  evidence  at  all.  In  the  second  place,  this  anony- 
mous book  says,  that  this  slaughter  was  done  by  the  express 
command  of  God:  but  all  our  ideas  of  the  justice  and  good- 
ness of  God  give  the  lie  to  the  book,  and  as  I  never  wm  be- 
lieve any  book  that  ascribes  cruelty  and  injustice  to' God,  I, 
therefore,  reject  the  Bible  as  unworthy  of  credit. 

As  I  have  now  given  you  my  reasons  for  believing  that  the 
Bible  is  not  the  word  of  God,  and  that  it  is  a  falsehood,  I 
have  a  right  to  ask  you  your  reasons  for  believing  the  con- 
trary ;  but  I  know  you  can  give  me  none,  except  that  you 
were  educated  to  believe  the  JBible,  and  as  the  Turks  give  the 
same  reason  for  believing  the  Koran,  it  is  evident  that  edu- 
cation makes  all  the  difference,  and  that  reason  and  truth 
have  nothing  to  do  in  the  case.  You  believe  in  the  Bible 
from  the  accident  of  birth,  and  the  Turks  believe  in  the 
Koran  from  the  same  accident,  and  each  calls  the  other  infi- 
dd. — But  leaving  the  prejudice  of  education  out  of  the  case, 
the  unprejudiced  truth  is,  that  all  are  infidels  who  believe 
falsely  of  God,  whether  they  draw  their  creed  from  the  Bi- 
ble, or  from  the  Koran,  from  the  Old  Testament  or  from  the 
New. 

When  you  have  examined  the  Bible  with  the  attention 
that  I  have  done,  (for  I  do  not  think  you  know  much  about 
it,)  and  permit  yourself  to  have  just  ideas  of  God,  you  will 
most  probably  believe  as  I  do.  But  I  wish  you  to  know  that 
this  answer  to  your  letter  is  not  written  for  the  purpose  of 
changing  your  opinion.  It  is  written  to  satisfy  you,  and 
some  other  friends  whom  I  esteem,  that  my  disbelief  of  the 
Bible  is  founded  on  a  pure  and  religious  belief  in  God ;  for, 
in  my  opinion,  the  Bible  is  a  gross  libel  against  the  justice 
and  goodness  of  God,  in  almost  every  part  of  it. 

THOMAS  PAINK. 


CONTRADICTORY    DOCTRINES 
THE    NEW    TESTAMENT, 


MATTHEW   AND    MARK. 


IN  the  New  Testament,  Mark,  chap.  xvi.  ver.  16,  it  is  said 
"  He  that  believeth  and  is  baptized  snail  be  saved ;  he  that 
believeth  not  shall  be  damned."  This  is  making  salvation, 
or,  in  other  words,  the  happiness  of  man  after  this  life,  to 
depend  entirely  on  believing,  or  on  what  Christians  call 
faith. 

But  the  25th  chapter  of  The  Gospel  according  to  Matthew 
makes  Jesus  Christ  to  preach  a  direct  contrary  doctrine  to 
The  Gospel  according  to  Mark /  for  it  makes  salvation,  or 
the  future  happiness  of  man,  to  depend  entirely  on  good 
works  ;  and  those  good  works  are  not  works  done  to  God, 
for  he  needs  them  not,  but  good  works  done  to  man. 

The  passage  referred  to  in  Matthew  is  the  account  there 
given  of  what  is  called  the  last  day,  or  the  day  of  judgment, 
where  the  whole  world  is  represented  to  be  divided  into  two 
parts,  the  righteous  and  the  unrighteous,  mataphorically 
called  the  sheep  and  the  goats. 

To  the  one  part  called  the  righteous,  or  the  sheep,  it  says, 
"  Come  ye  blessed  of  my  father,  inherit  the  kingdom  pre- 
pared for  you  from  the  beginning  of  the  world — for  I  was 
an  hungered  and  ye  gave  me  meat — I  was  thirsty  and  ye 
gave  me  drink — I  was  a  stranger  and  ye  took  me  in — Naked 
and  ye  clothed  me— I  was  sick  and  ye  visited  me — I  was  in 
prison  and  ye  came  unto  me." 

"  Then  shall  the  righteous  answer  him,  saying,  Lord,  when 
saw  we  thee  an  hungered  and  fed  thee,  or  thirsty  and  gave 
thee  drink  ?  When  saw  we  thee  a  stranger  and  took  thee 
in,  or  naked  and  clothed  thee  ?  Or  when  saw  we  thee  sick 
and  in  prison,  and  came  unto  thee  ? 

MB 


OONTRADIOTOBY   DOCTRINES   EN"   THE   NEW   TESTAMENT.     269 

"  And  the  king  shall  answer  and  say  unto  them,  verify  1 
say  unto  you,  in  as  much  as  ye  have  done  it  unto  one  of  the 
least  of  these  my  brethren,  ye  have  done  it  unto  me." 

Here  is  nothing  about  believing  in  Christ — nothing  about 
that  phantom  of  the  imagination  called  faith.  The  works 
*iere  spoken  of,  are  works  of  humanity  and  benevolence,  or, 
*n  other  words,  an  endeavour  to  make  G-od's  creation  happy. 
Here  is  nothing  about  preaching  and  making  long  prayers, 
as  if  God  must  be  dictated  to  by  man ;  n'or  about  building 
churches  and  meetings,  nor  hiring  priests  to  pray  and 
preach  in  them.  Here  is  nothing  about  predestination,  that 
lust  which  some  men  have  for  damning  one  another.  Here 
is  nothing  about  baptism,  whether  by  sprinkling  or  plung- 
ing, nor  about  any  of  those  ceremonies  for  which  the  Christ- 
ian church  has  been  fighting,  persecuting,  and  burning  each 
other,  ever  since  the  Christian  church  began. 

If  it  be  asked,  why  do  not  priests  preacn  the  doctrine  con 
tamed  in  this  chapter  ?     The  answer  is  easy ; — they  are  not 
fond  of  practising  it  themselves.    It  does  not  answer  for 
their  trade.     They  had  rather  get  than  give.     Charity  with 
them  begins  and  ends  at  home. 

Had  it  been  said,  Come  ye  blessed,  ye  have  been  liberal  ^n 
paying  the  preachers  of  the  word,  ye  have  contributed  largely 
towards  building  churches  and  meeting-houses,  there  is  not  a 
hired  priest  in  Christendom  but  would  have  thundered  it 
continually  in  the  ears  of  his  congregation.  But  as  it  is 
altogether  on  good  works  done  to  men,  the  priests  pass  over 
it  in  silence,  and  they  will  abuse  me  for  bringing  it  into 
aotice. 

THOMAS  PAINE. 


Ml 

PRIVATE    THOUGHTS 

ON   A  FUTURE   STATE. 


I  HAVE  said,  in  the  first  part  of  the  Age  of  Keason,  that 
"  1  hope  for  ha/ppiness  after  this  life"  This  hope  is  com- 
fortable to  me,  and  I  presume  not  to  go  beyond  the  com- 
fortable idea  of  hope,  with  respect  to  a  future  state. 

I  consider  myself  in  the  hands  of  my  Creator,  and  that  he 
will  dispose  of  me  after  this  life  consistently  with  his  justice 
and  goodness.  I  leave  all  these  matters  to  him,  as  my 
Creator  and  friend,  and  I  hold  it  to  be  presumption  in  man 
to  make  an  article  of  faith  as  to  what  the  Creator  will  do 
with  us  hereafter. 

I  do  not  believe  because  a  man  and  a  woman  make  a 
child,  that  it  imposes  on  the  Creator  the  unavoidable  obli- 

fation  of  keeping  the  being  so  made,  in  eternal  existence 
ereafter.  It  is  in  his  power  to  do  so,  or  not  to  do  so,  and 
it  is  not  in  our  power  to  decide  which  he  will  do. 

The  book  called  the  New  Testament,  which  I  hold  to  be 
fabulous  and  have  shown  to  be  false,  gives  an  account  in 
the  25th  chapter  of  Matthew,  of  what  is  there  called  the 
last  day,  or  the  day  of  judgment.  The  whole  world,  accord- 
ing to  that  account,  is  divided  into  two  parts,  the  righteous 
and  the  unrighteous,  figuratively  called  the  sheep  and  the 
goats.  They  are  then  to  receive  their  sentence.  To  the 
one,  figuratively  called  the  sheep,  it  says,  "  Come  ye  blessed 
of  my  Father,  inherit  the  kingdom  prepared  for  you  from 
the  foundation  of  the  world."  To  the  other,  figuratively 
called  the  goats,  it  says,  "  Depart  from  me,  ye  cursed,  into 
everlasting  fire,  prepared  for  the  devil  and  his  angels." 

Now  the  case  is,  the  world  cannot  be  thus  divided — the 
moral  world,  like  the  physical  world,  is  composed  of  numer- 
ous degrees  of  character,  running  imperceptibly  the  one  into 
the  other,  in  such  a  manner  that  no  fixed  point  of  division 

m 


LETTER  TO  OAMILLK  JORDAN.  271 

can  be  found  in  either.  That  point  is  no  where,  or  is  every 
where.  The  whole  world  might  be  divided  into  two  parts 
numerically,  but  not  as  to  moral  character  ;  and,  therefore, 
the  metaphor  of  dividing  them,  as  sheep  and  goats  can  be 
divided,  whose  difference  is  marked  by  their  external  figure, 
is  absurd.  All  sheep  are  still  sheep;  all  goats  are  still 
goats ;  it  is  their  physical  nature  to  be  so.  But  one  part  of 
the  world  are  not  all  good  alike,  nor  the  other  part  all 
wicked  alike.  There  are  some  exceedingly  good ;  others 
exceedingly  wicked.  There  is  another  description  of  men 
who  cannot  be  ranked  with  either  the  one  or  the  other — 
they  belong  neither  to  the  sheep  nor  the  goats. 

My  own  opinion  is,  that  those  whose  lives  have  been  spent 
in  doing  good,  and  endeavouring  to  make  their  fellow-mor- 
tals happy,  for  this  is  the  only  way  in  which  we  can  serve 
God,  wilt  be  happy  hereafter :  and  that  the  very  wicked 
will  meet  with  some  punishment.  This  is  my  opinion.  It 
is  consistent  with  my  idea  of  God's  justice,  and  with  the 
reason  that  God  has  given  me. 

THOMAS  PAINE. 


LETTER  TO  CAMILLE  JORDAN, 

ONE    OF   THE    COUNCIL    OF   MVR    HUNDRED, 

OCCASIONED  BY  HIS  KEPORT  ON  THE  PRIESTS,  PUBLIC 
WORSHIP,  AND  THE  BELLS, 


CITIZEN  REPRESENTATIVE, 

As  every  thing  in  your  report,  relating  to  what  you  call 
worship,  connects  itself  with  the  books  called  the  Scriptures, 
I  begin  with  a  quotation  therefrom.  It  may  serve  to  give  us 
some  idea  of  the  fanciful  origin  and  fabrication  of  those 
books.  2  Chronicles,  chap,  xxxiv.  ver.  14,  &c.  "  Hilkiah, 
the  priest,  found  the  book  of  the  law  of  the  Lord  given  by 
Moses.  And  Hilkiah,  the  priest,  said  to  Shaphan,  the  scribe, 
\  have  found  the  book  of  thu  law  in  the  house  of  the  Lord, 


272  LETTER   TO   CAMILLE   JORDAN. 


Hilkiah  delivered  the  book  to  Shaphan.  And  Shaphan, 
the  scribe,  told  the  king,  (Josiah,)  saying,  Hilkiah,  the  priest, 
hath  given  me  a  book. 

This  pretended  finding  was  about  a  thousand  years  after 
the  time  that  Moses  is  said  to  have  lived.  Before  this  pre- 
tended finding,  there  was  no  such  thing  practised  or  known 
in  the  world  as  that  which  is  called  the  law  of  Moses.  This 
being  the  case,  there  is  every  apparent  evidence,  that  the 
books  called  the  books  of  Moses  (and  which  make  the  first 
part  of  what  are  called  the  Scriptures)  and  forgeries  contrived 
between  a  priest  and  a  limb  of  the  law,*  Hilkiah,  and  Sha- 
phan,  the  scribe,  a  thousand  years  after  Moses  is  said  to  have 
been  dead. 

Thus  much  for  the  first  part  of  the  Bible.  Every  other 
part  is  marked  with  circumstances  equally  as  suspicious. 
we  ought,  therefore,,  to  be  reverentially  careful  how  we 
ascribe  books  as  his  word,  of  which  there  is  no  evidence,  and 
against  which  there  is  abundant  evidence  to  the  contrary, 
and  every  cause  to  suspect  imposition. 

In  your  report  you  speak  continually  of  something  by  the 
name  of  worship,  and  you  confine  yourself  to  speak  of  one 
kind  only,  as  if  there  were  but  one,  and  that  one  was  unques- 
tionably true. 

The  modes  of  worship  are  as  various  as  the  sects  are 
numerous;  and  amidst  all  this  variety  and  multiplicity 
there  is  but  one  article  of  belief  in  which  every  religion  in 
the  world  agrees.  That  article  has  universal  sanction.  It  is 
the  belief  of  a  God,  or  what  the  Greeks  described  by  the 
word  Theism,  and  the  Latins  by  that  of  Deism.  Upon  this 
one  article  have  been  erected  all  the  different  super-struc- 
tures of  creeds  and  ceremonies  continually  warring  with 
each  other  that  now  exists  or  ever  existed.  But  the  men 
most  and  best  informed  upon  the  subject  of  theology,  rest 
themselves  upon  this  universal  article,  and  hold  all  the 
various  super-structures  erected  thereon,  to  be  at  least  doubt- 
ful, if  not  altogether  artificial. 

The  intellectual  part  of  religion  is  a  private  affair  between 
every  man  and  his  Maker,  and  in  which  no  third  party  has 
any  right  to  interfere.  The  practical  part  consists  in  our 
doing  good  to  each  other.  But  since  religion  has  been  made 
into  a  trade,  the  practical  part  has  been  made  to  consist  of 
ceremonies  performed  by  men  called  priests  ;  and  the  peo- 
ple have  been  amused  with  ceremonial  shows,  processions. 

*  It  happens  that  Camille  Jordan  is  a  limb  of  the  law. 


LETTER   TO   CAMTT.LE   JORDAN.  273 

and  bells.*  By  devices  of  this  kind  true  religion  has  been 
banished  and  such  means  have  been  found  out  to  extract 
money  even  from  the  pockets  of  the  poor,  instead  of  con- 
tributing to  their  relief; 

No  man  ought  to  make  a  living  by  religion.  It  is  dishon- 
est so  to  do.  Keligion  is  not  an  act  that  can  be  performed 
by  proxy.  One  person  cannot  act  religion  for  another. 
Every  person  must  perform  it  for  himself :  and  all  that  a 
priest  can  do  is  to  talce  from  him,  he  wants  nothing  but  his 

*  The  precise  date  of  the  invention  of  bells  cannot  be  traced.  The  ancients, 
it  appears  from  Martial,  Juvenal,  Suetonius  and  others,  had  an  article  named 
tintiunabula,  (usually  translated  bell,)  by  which  the  Romans  were  summoned 
to  their  baths  and  public  places.  It  seems  most  probable,  that  the  description 
of  belis  now  used  in  churches,  were  invented  about  the  year  400,  and  generally 
adopted  before  the  commencement  of  the  seventh  century.  Previous  to  theu 
invention,  however,  sounding  brass,  and  sometimes  basins,  were  used;  and  to 
the  present  day  the  Greek  church  have  boards,  or  iron  plates,  full  of  holes, 
•which  they  strike  with  a  hammer,  or  mallet,  to  summon  the  priests  and  others 
to  divine  service.  We  may  also  remark,  that  in  our  own  country,  it  was  the 
custom  in  monasteries  to  visit  every  person's  cell  early  in  the  morning,  and 
knock  on  the  door  with  a  similar  instrument,  called  the  wakening  mallet — doubt- 
less no  very  pleasing  intrusion  on  the  slumbers  of  the  Monks. 

But,  the  use  of  bells  having  been  established,  it  was  found  that  devils  were 
terrified  at  the  sound,  and  slunk  in  haste  away ;  in  consequence  of  which  it 
was  thought  necessary  to  baptize  them  in  a  solemn  manner,  which  appears  to 
have  been  first  done  by  Pope  John  XII.  A.  D.  968.  A  record  of  this  practice 
still  exists  in  the  Tom  of  Lincoln,  and  the  great  Tom  at  Oxford,  &c. 

Having  thus  laid  the  foundation  of  superstitious  veneration,  in  the  hearts  of 
the  common  people,  it  cannot  be  a  matter  of  surprise,  that  they  were  soon  used 
at  rejoicings,  and  high  festivals  in  the  church  (for  the  purpose  of  driving 
away  any  evil  spirit  which  might  be  in  the  neighborhood)  as  well  as  on  the 
arrival  of  any  great  personage,  on  which  occasion  the  usual  fee  was  one 
penny. 

One  other  custom  remains  to  be  explained,  viz.,  tolling  bell  on  the  occasion 
of  any  person's  death,  a  custom  which,  in  the  manner  now  practised,  is  totally 
different  from  ils  original  institution.  It  appears  to  have  been  used  as  early 
as  the  7th  century,  when  bells  were  first  generally  used  and  to  have  been  de- 
nominated the  soul  bell,  (as  it  signified  the  departing  of  the  soul,)  as  also,  the 
passing  bell.  Thus  Wheatly  tefls  us,  "  Our  church,  in  imitation  of  the  Saints 
of  former  ages,  calls  in  the  Minister  and  others  who  are  at  hand,  to  assist  their 
brother  in  his  last  extremity ;  in  order  to  this,  she  directs  a  bell  should  be  tolled 
when  any  one  is  passing  out  of  this  life."  Durand  also  says — "  When  any 
one  is  dying,  bells  must  be  tolled,  that  the  people  may  put  up  their  prayers  for 
him  ;  let  this  be  done  twice  for  a  woman,  and  thrice  for  a  man.  If  for  a  cler- 
gyman, as  many  times  as  he  had  orders ;  and,  at  the  conclusion,  a  peal  on  all 
the  bells,  to  distinguish  the  quality  of  the  person  for  whom  the  people  are  to 
put  up  their  prayers." — From  these  passages,  it  appears  evident  that  the  bell 
was  to  be  tolled  before  a  person's  decease  rather  than  after,  as  at  the  present 
day  ;  and  that  the  object  was  to  obtain  the  prayers  of  all  who  heard  it,  for  the 
repose  of  the  soul  of  their  departing  neighbour.  At  first,  when  the  tolling 
took  place  after  the  person's  decease,  it  was  deemed  superstitious,  and  was 
partially  disused,  which  was  found  materially  to  affect  the  revenue  of  the  church. 
The  priesthood  having  removed  the  objection,  bells  were  again  tolled,  upon 
payment  of  the  customary  lees. — Eimli*h  Paper, 


274  LETTER   TO   CAMILLE   JORDAN. 

money,  and  then  to  riot  in  the  spoil  and  laugh  at  Ins 
credulity. 

The  only  people,  as  a  professional  sect  of  Christians,  who 
provide  for  the  poor  of  their  society,  are  people  known  by 
the  name  of  Quakers.  Those  men  have  no  priests.  They 
assemble  quietly  in  their  places  of  meeting,  and  do  not  dis- 
turb their  neighbours  with  shows  and  noise  of  bells.  Reli- 
gion does  not  unite  itself  to  show  and  noise.  True  religion 
is  without  either.  Where  there  is  both  there  is  no  true 
religion. 

The  first  object  for  inquiry  in  all  cases,  more  especially  in 
matters  of  religious  concern,  is  TRUTH.  "We  ought  to 
inquire  into  the  truth  of  whatever  we  are  taught  to  believe, 
and  it  is  certain  that  the  books  called  the  Scriptures  stand, 
in  this  respect,  in  more  than  a  doubtful  predicament.  They 
have  been  held  in  existence,  and  in  a  sort  of  credit  among 
the  common  class  of  people,  by  art,  terror,  and  persecution. 
They  have  little  or  no  credit  among  the  enlightened  part, 
but  they  have  been  made  the  means  of  encumbering  the 
world  with  a  numerous  priesthood,  who  have  fattened  on 
the  labour  of  the  people,  and  consumed  the  sustenance  that 
ought  to  be  applied  to  the  widows  and  the  poor. 

It  is  a  want  of  feeling  to  talk  of  priests  and  bells  whilst 
so  many  infants  are  perishing  in  the  hospitals,  and  aged  and 
infirm  poor  in  the  streets,  from  the  want  of  necessaries. 
The  abundance  that  France  produces  is  sufficient  for  every 
want,  if  rightly  applied  ;  but  priests  and  bells,  like  articles 
of  luxury,  ought  to  be  the  least  articles  of  consideration. 

We  talk  of  religion.  Let  us  talk  of  truth ;  for  that  which 
is  not  truth,  is  not  worthy  the  name  of  religion. 

We  see  different  parts  of  the  world  overspread  with  dif- 
ferent books,  each  of  which,  though  contradictory  to  the 
other,  is  said  by  its  partisans,  to  be  of  divine  origin,  and  is 
made  a  rule  of  faith  and  practice.  In  countries  under  des- 
potic governments,  where  inquiry  is  always  forbidden,  the 
people  are  condemned  to  believe  as  they  have  been  taught 
by  their  priests.  This  was  for  many  centuries  the  case  in 
France :  but  this  link  in  the  chain  of  slavery,  is  happily 
broken  by  the  revolution ;  and,  that  it  may  never  be  rivetted 
again,  let  us  employ  a  part  of  the  liberty  we  enjoy  in  scru- 
tinizing into  the  truth.  Let  us  leave  behind  us  some  monu- 
ment, that  we  have  made  the  cause  and  honour  of  our 
Creator  an  object  of  our  care.  If  we  have  been  imposed 
upon  by  the  terrors  of  government  and  the  artifice  of  priesta 


LETTER  TO   CAMTLLE   JOKDAH.  275 

in  matters  of  religion,  let  us  do  justice  to  our  Creator  by 
examining  into  the  case.  His  name  is  too  sacred  to  be  affixed 
to  any  thing  which  is  fabulous  ;  and  it  is  our  duty  to  inquire 
whether  we  believe,  or  encourage  the  people  to  believe,  in 
fables  or  in  facts 

It  would  be  a  project  worthy  the  situation  we  are  in,  to 
invite  in  inquiry  01  this  kind.  We  have  committees  for 
various  objects ;  and,  among  others,  a  committee  for  bells. 
We  have  institutions,  academies,  and  societies  for  various 
purposes;  but  we  have  none  for  inquiring  into  historical 
truth  in  matters  of  religious  concern. 

They  show  us  certain  books  which  they  call  the  Holy 
Scriptures,  the  word  of  God,  and  other  names  of  that  kind ; 
but  we  ought  to  know  what  evidence  there  is  for  our  believ- 
ing them  to  be  so,  and  at  what  time  they  originated  and  in 
what  manner.  We  know  that  men  could  make  books,  and 
we  know  that  artifice  and  superstition  could  give  them  a 
name  ;  could  call  them  sacred.  But  we  ought  to  be  careful 
that  the  name  of  our  Creator  be  not  abused.  Let  then  all 
the  evidence  with  respect  to  those  books  be  made  a  subject 
of  inquiry.  If  there  be  evidence  to  warrant  our  belief  of 
them,  let  us  encourage  the  propagation  of  it :  but  if  not, 
let  us  be  careful  not  to  promote  the  cause  of  delusion  and 
falsehood. 

I  have  already  spoken  of  the  Quakers — that  they  have  no 
priests,  no  bells — and  that  they  are  remarkable  for  their  care 
of  the  poor  of  their  society.  They  are  equally  as  remark- 
able for  the  education  of  their  children.  I  am  a  descendant 
of  a  family  of  that  profession ;  my  father  was  a  Quaker ; 
and  I  presume  I  may  be  admitted  an  evidence  of  what  I 
assert.  The  seeds  of  good  principles,  and  the  literary  means 
of  advancement  in  the  world,  are  laid  in  early  life.  Instead, 
therefore,  of  consuming  the  substance  of  the  nation  upon 
priests,  whose  life  at  best  is  a  life  of  idleness,  let  us  think  of 
providing  for  the  education  of  those  who  have  not  the  means 
of  doing  it  themselves.  One  good  schoolmaster  is  of  more 
use  than  a  hundred  priests. 

If  we  look  back  at  what  was  the  condition  of  France  un- 
der the  ancient  regime,  we  cannot  acquit  the  priests  of  cor- 
rupting the  morals  of  the  nation.  Their  pretended  celibacy 
led  them  to  carry  debauchery  and  domestic  infidelity  into 
every  family  where  they  could  gain  admission ;  and  their 
blasphemous  pretensions  to  forgive  sins,  encouraged  the 
commission  of  them.  Why  has  the  Revolution  of  France 


276  LETTER   TO   CAMILLE   JOKDAN. 

been  stained  with  crimes  which  the  Revolution  of  the  Uni- 
ted States  of  America  was  not  ?  Men  are  physically  the 
same  in  all  countries  ;  it  is  education  that  makes  them  differ- 
ent. Accustom  a  people  tt  believe  that  priests,  or  any  other 
class  of  men,  can  forgive  sins,  and  you  will  have  Bins  in 
abundance. 

I  come  now  to  speak  more  particularly  to  the  object  of 
your  report. 

You  claim  a  privilege  incompatible  with  the  constitution 
and  with  rights.  The  constitution  protects  equally,  as  it 
ought  to  do,  every  profession  of  religion  ;  it  gives  no  exclu- 
sive privilege  to  any.  The  churches  are  the  common  pro- 
perty of  all  the  people ;  they  are  national  goods,  and  cannot 
be  given  exclusively  to  any  one  profession,  because  the  right 
does  not  exist  of  giving  to  any  one  that  which  appertains  to 
all.  It  would  be  consistent  with  right  that  the  churches  be 
sold,  and  the  money  arising  therefrom  be  invested  as  a  fund 
for  the  education  of  children  of  poor  parents  of  every  pro- 
fession, and,  if  more  than  sufficient  for  this  purpose,  that  the 
surplus  be  appropriated  to  the  support  01  the  aged  poor. 
After  this,  every  profession  can  erect  its  own  place  of  wor- 
ship, if  it  choose — support  its  own  priests,  if  it  choose  to 
have  any — or  perform  its  worship  without  priests,  as  the 
Quakers  do. 

As  to  the  bells,  they  are  a  public  nuisance.  If  one  pro- 
fession is  to  have  bells,  another  has  the  right  to  use  the 
instruments  of  the  same  kind,  or  any  other  noisy  instrument. 
Some  may  choose  to  meet  at  the  sound  of  cannon,  another  at 
the  beat  of  drum,  another  at  the  sound  of  trumpets,  and  so 
on,  until  the  whole  becomes  a  scene  of  general  confusion. 
But  if  we  permit  ourselves  to  think  of  the  state  of  the  sick, 
and  the  many  sleepless  nights  and  days  they  undergo,  we 
shall  feel  the  impropriety  of  increasing  their  distress  by  the 
noise  of  bells,  or  any  other  noisy  instruments. 

Quiet  and  private  domestic  devotion  neither  offends  nor 
incommodes  any  body;  and  the  constitution  has  wisely 
guarded  against  the  use  of  externals.  Bells  come  under  this 
description,  and  public  processions  still  more  so — Streets  and 
highways  are  for  the  accommodation  of  persons  following 
their  several  occupations,  and  no  sectary  nas  a  right  to  in- 
commode them — If  any  one  has,  every  other  has  the  same ; 
and  the  meeting  of  various  and  contradictory  processions 
would  be  tumultuous.  Those  who  formed  the  constitution 
had  wisely  reflected  upon  these  cases ;  and,  whilst  they 


LETTER   TO   CAMILLE    JOEDAN.  277 

were  careful  to  reserve  the  equal  right  of  every  one,  they 
restrained  every  one  from  giving  onence,  or  incommoding 
another. 

Men  who,  through  a  long  and  tumultuous  scene,  have 
lived  in  retirement  as  you  have  done,  may  think,  when  they 
arrive  at  power,  that  nothing  is  more  easy  than  to  put  the 
world  to  rights  in  an  instant ;  they  form  to  themselves  gay 
ideas  at  the  success  of  their  projects ;  but  they  forget  to  con- 
template the  difficulties  that  attend  them,  and  the  dangers 
with  which  they  are  pregnant.  Alas  !  nothing  is  so  easy  as 
to  deceive  one's  self.  Did  all  men  think,  as  you  think,  or  as 
you  say,  your  plan  would  need  no  advocate,  because  it  would 
have  no  opposer ;  but  there  are  millions  who  think  differ- 
ently to  you,  and  who  are  determined  to  be  neither  the  dupes 
nor  the  slaves  of  error  or  design. 

It  is  your  good  fortune  to  arrive  at  power,  when  the  sun- 
shine 01  prosperity  is  breathing  forth  after  a  long  and  stormy 
night.  The  firmness  of  your  colleagues,  and  of  those  you 
have  succeeded — the  unabated  energy  of  the  Directory,  and 
the  unequalled  bravery  of  the  armies  of  the  Republic,  have 
made  the  way  smooth  and  easy  to  you.  If  you  look  back  at 
the  difficulties  that  existed  when  the  constitution  commenced, 
you  cannot  but  be  confounded  with  admiration  at  the  differ- 
ence between  that  time  and  now.  At  that  moment  the  Di- 
rectory were  placed  like  the  forlorn  hope  of  an  army,  but 
you  were  in  safe  retirement.  They  occupied  the  post  of 
honourable  danger,  and  they  have  merited  well  of  their 
country. 

You  talk  of  justice  and  benevolence,  but  you  begin  at  the 
wrong  end.  The  defenders  of  your  country,  and  the  deplor- 
able state  of  the  poor,  are  objects  of  prior  consideration  to 
priests  and  bells  and  gaudy  processions. 

You  talk  of  peace,  but  your  manner  of  talking  of  it  em- 
barrasses the  Directory  in  making  it,  and  serves  to  prevent 
it.  Had  you  been  an  actor  in  all  the  scenes  of  government 
from  its  commencement,  you  would  have  been  too  well 
informed  to  have  brought  forward  projects  that  operate  to 
encourage  the  enemy.  When  you  arrived  at  a  share  in  the 
government,  you  found  every  thing  tending  to  a  prosperous 
issue.  A  series  of  victories  unequalled  in  the  world,  and  in 
the  obtaining  of  which  you  had  no  share,  preceded  your 
arrival.  Every  enemy  but  one  was  subdued ;  and  that  one, 
(the  Hanoverian  government  of  England,)  deprived  of  every 
hope,  and  a  bankrupt  in  all  its  resources,  was  sueing  for 


278  LETTER   TO   CAMLLLE    JOKDAN. 

peace.  In  such  a  state  of  things,  no  new  question  that  might 
tend  to  agitate  and  anarchize  the  interior,  ought  to  have  had 
place ;  and  the  project  you  propose,  tends  directly  to  that 
end. 

Whilst  France  was  a  monarchy,  and  under  the  govern- 
ment of  those  things  called  kings  and  priests,  England  could 
always  defeat  her :  but  since  France  has  RISEN  TO  BE  A 
REPUBLIC,  the  GOVERNMENT  OF  ENGLAND  crouches  beneath 
her,  so  great  is  the  difference  between  a  government  of  kings 
and  priests,  and  that  which  is  founded  on  the  system  of 
representation.  But,  could  the  government  of  England  find 
a  way,  under  the  sanction  of  your  report,  to  inundate  France 
with  a  flood  of  emigrant  priests,  she  would  find  also  the  way 
to  domineer  as  before;  she  would  retrieve  her  shattered 
finances  at  your  expense,  and  the  ringing  of  bells  would  be 
the  tocsiii  of  your  downfall. 

Did  peace  consist  in  nothing  but  the  cessation  of  war,  it 
would  not  be  difficult ;  but  the  terms  are  yet  to  be  arranged ; 
and  those  terms  will  be  better  or  worse,  in  proportion  as 
France  and  her  councils  be  united  or  divided.  That  the 
government  of  England  counts  much  upon  your  report,  and 
upon  others  of  a  similar  tendency,  is  what  the  writer  of  this 
letter,  who  knows  that  government  well,  has  no  doubt.  You 
are  but  new  on  the  theatre  of  government,  and  you  ought  to 
suspect  yourself  of  misjudging;  the  experience  of  those 
•who  have  gone  before  you,  should  be  of  some  service  to 
you. 

But  if,  in  consequence  of  such  measures  as  you  propose, 
you  put  it  out  of  the  power  of  the  Directory  to  make  a  good 
peace,  and  to  accept  of  terms  you  would  afterwards  repro- 
bate, it  is  yourselves  that  must  bear  the  censure. 

You  conclude  your  report  by  the  following  address  to  your 
colleagues : — 

"  Let  us  hasten,  representatives  of  the  people !  to  affix  to 
these  tutelary  laws  the  seal  of  our  unanimous  approba- 
tion. All  our  fellow-citizens  will  learn  to  cherish  political 
liberty  from  the  enjoyment  of  religious  liberty:  you  will 
have  broken  the  most  powerful  arm  of  your  enemies ;  you 
will  have  surrounded  this  assembly  with  the  most  impreg- 
nant  rampart — confidence,  and  the  people's  love.  O !  my 
colleagues!  how  desirable  is  that  popularity  which  is  the 
offspring  of  good  laws !  What  a  consolation  it  will  be  to  us 
hereafter,  when  returned  to  our  own  fire-sides,  to  hear  from 
the  mouths  of  our  fellow-citizens,  these  simple  expressions — 


LETTER   TO   GAMILLE   JORDAN.  27ft 

Blessings  reward  you,  men  of  peace  !  you  have  restored  to 
us  our  temples — our  ministers — the  liberty  of  adoring  the 
God  of  our  fathers :  you  have  recalled  harmony  to  our  fami- 
lies— morality  to  our  hearts :  you  have  made  us  adore  the 
legislature  and  respect  all  its  laws  /" 

Is  it  possible,  citizen  representative,  that  you  can  be  serious 
in  this  address  ?  Were  the  lives  of  the  priests  under  the 
ancient  regime  such  as  to  justify  anything  you  say  of  them  ? 
"Were  not  all  France  convinced  of  their  immorality  ?  Were 
they  not  considered  as  the  patrons  of  debauchery  and  do- 
mestic infidelity,  and  not  as  the  patrons  of  morals  ?  What 
was  their  pretended  celibacy  but  perpetual  adultery  ?  What 
was  their  blasphemous  pretentious  to  forgive  sins,  but  an 
encouragement  to  the  commission  of  them,  and  a  love  for 
their  own  ?  Do  you  want  to  lead  again  into  France  all  the 
vices  of  which  they  have  been  the  patrons,  and  to  overspread 
the  republic  with  English  pensioners  !  It  is  cheaper  to  cor- 
rupt than  to  conquer ;  and  the  English  government,  unable 
to  conquer,  will  stoop  to  corrupt.  Arrogance  and  mean- 
ness, though  in  appearance  opposite,  are  vices  of  the  same 
heart. 

Instead  of  concluding  in  the  manner  you  have  done,  you 
ought  rather  to  have  said. 

"  O  1  my  colleagues !  we  are  arrived  at  a  glorious  period 
— a  period  that  promises  more  than  we  could  have  expected, 
and  all  that  we  could  have  wished.  Let  usj  hasten  to  take 
into  consideration  the  honours  and  rewards  due  to  our  brave 
defenders.  Let  us  hasten  to  give  encouragement  to  agricul- 
ture and  manufactures,  that  commerce  may  reinstate  itself, 
and  our  people  have  employment.  Let  us  review  the  condi- 
tion of  the  suffering  poor,  and  wipe  from  our  country  the 
reproach  of  forgetting  them.  Let  us  devise  means  to  estab- 
lish schools  of  instruction,  that  we  may  banish  the  ignorance 
that  the  ancient  regime  of  kings  and  priests  had  spread 
among  the  people.— Let  us  propagate  morality,  unfettered 
by  superstition — Let  us  cultivate  justice  and  benevolence, 
that  the  God  of  our  fathers  may  bless  us.  The  helpless  in- 
fant and  the  aged  poor  cry  to  us  to  remember  them — Let 
not  wretchedness  be  seen  in  our  streets — Let  France  exhibit 
to  the  world  the  glorious  example  of  expelling  ignorance  and 
misery  together. 

"  Let  these,  my  virtuous  colleagues,  be  the  subject  of  our 
care,  that,  when  we  return  among  our  fellow-citizens,  they 
may  say,  Worthy  representatives!  you  have  done  well.  You 


280  DISCOURSE   TO   THE   SOCIETY 

have  done  justice  and  honor  to  our  brave  defenders.  You 
have  encouraged  agriculture — cherished  our  decayed  manu- 
factures— given  new  life  to  commerce,  and  employment  to 
our  people.  You  have  removed  from  our  country  the  reproach 
of  forgetting  the  poor —  You  have  caused  the  cry  of  the  orphan 
to  cease —  You  have  wiped  the  tear  from  the  eye  of  the  suffer- 
ing mother —  You  have  given  comfort  to  the  aged  and  infirm 
—  You  have  penetrated  into  the  gloomy  recesses  of  wretched" 
ness,  and  have  banished  it.  Welcome  among  us,  ye  brave 
and  virtuous  representatives  !  and  may  your  example  be  fol- 
lowed by  your  successors  /" 

THOMAS  PAINE. 

Paris,  1797. 


A  DISCOURSE 


DELIVERED  TO  THE  SOCIETY  OF  THEOPHILANTHROPIST8 

AT  PARIS. 


RELIGION  has  two  principal  enemies,  Fanaticism  and  In- 
fidelity, or  that  which  is  called  atheism.  The  first  requires 
to  be  combated  by  reason  and  morality,  the  other  by  natural 
philosophy. 

The  existence  of  a  God  is  the  first  dogma  of  the  Theophi- 
lanthropists.  It  is  upon  this  subject  that  I  solicit  your  at- 
tention ;  for  though  it  has  been  often  treated  of,  and  that 
most  sublimely,  the  subject  is  inexhaustible;  and  there  will 
always  remain  something  to  be  said  that  has  not  been  before 
advanced.  I  go,  therefore,  to  open  the  subject,  and  to  crave 
your  attention  to  the  end. 

The  universe  is  the  Bible  of  a  true  Theophilanthropist.  It 
is  there  that  he  reads  of  God.  It  is  there  that  the  proofs  of 
his  existence  are  to  be  sought  and  to  be  found.  As  to  writ- 
ten or  printed  books,  by  whatever  name  they  are  called, 
they  are  the  works  of  man's  hands,  and  carry  no  evidence 
in  themselves  that  God  is  the  author  of  any  of  them.  It 
must  be  in  something  that  man  could  not  make,  that  we 


OF  TKEOPHILANTHROPI8T8.  281 

must  seek  evidence  for  our  belief,  and  that  something  is  the 
universe ;  the  true  Bible ;  the  inimitable  work  of  God. 

Contemplating  the  universe,  the  whole  system  of  creation, 
in  this  point  of  light,  we  shall  discover,  that  all  that  which 
is  called  natural  pnilosophy  is  properly  a  divine  study.  It 
is  the  study  of  God  through  his  works.  It  is  the  best  study 
by  which  we  can  arrive  at  a  knowledge  of  his  existence, 
and  the  only  one  by  which  we  can  gam  a  glimpse  of  hia 
perfection. 

Do  we  want  to  contemplate  his  power  ?  "We  see  it  in  the 
immensity  of  the  Creation.  Do  we  want  to  contemplate  his 
wisdom  ?  We  see  it  in  the  unchangeable  order  by  which, 
the  incomprehensible  WHOLE  is  governed.  Do  we  want  to 
contemplate  his  munificence  ?  We  see  it  in  the  abundance 
with  which  he  fills  the  earth.  Do  we  want  to  contemplate 
his  mercy  \  We  see  it  in  his  not  withholding  that  abundance 
even  from  the  unthankful.  In  fine,  do  we  want  to  know 
what  God  is  ?  Search  not  written  or  printed  books ;  but  the 
scripture  called  the  Creation. 

It  has  been  the  error  of  the  schools  to  teach  astronomy, 
and  all  the  other  sciences,  and  subjects  of  natural  philosophy, 
as  accomplishments  only ;  whereas  they  should  be  taught 
theologically,  or  with  reference  to  the  Being  who  is  the  au- 
thor of  them  ;  for  all  the  principles  of  science  are  of  divine 
origin.  Man  cannot  make,  or  invent,  or  contrive  principles. 
He  can  only  discover  them ;  and  he  ought  to  look  through 
thrt  discovery  to  the  author. 

When  we  examine  an  extraordinary  piece  of  machinery, 
an  astonishing  pile  of  architecture,  a  well  executed  statue,  or 
an  highly  fimsned  painting,  where  life  and  action  are  imi- 
tated, and  habit  only  prevents  our  mistaking  a  surface  of 
light  and  shade  for  cubical  solidity,  our  ideas  are  naturally 
led  to  think  of  the  extensive  genius  and  talents  of  the  artist. 
When  we  study  the  elements  of  geometry,  we  think  of 
Euclid.  When  we  speak  of  gravitation,  we  think  of  New- 
ton. How  then  is  it,  that  when  we  study  the  works  of  God 
in  the  Creation,  we  stop  short  and  do  not  think  of  God  ?  It  is 
from  the  error  of  the  schools  in  having  taught  those  subjects 
as  accomplishments  only,  and  thereby  separated  the  study 
of  them  from  the  being  who  is  the  author  of  them. 

The  schools  have  made  the  study  of  theology  to  consist  in 
the  study  of  opinions  in  written  or  printed  books ;  whereas 
theology  should  be  studied  in  the  works  or  books  of  the 
Creation.  The  study  of  theology  in  books  of  opinions  has 


DI8COUB8E   TO    THE   SOCIETY 


often  produced  fanaticism,  rancour,  and  cruelty  of  temper ; 
and  from  hence  have  proceeded  the  numerous  persecutions, 
the  fanatical  quarrels,  the  religious  burnings  and  massacres, 
that  have  desolated  Europe.  IBut  the  study  of  theology  in 
the  works  of  the  Creation  produces  a  direct  contrary  effect. 
The  mind  becomes  at  once  enlightened  and  serene ;  a 
copy  of  the  scene  it  beholds:  information  and  adoration 
go  hand  in  hand;  and  all  the  social'  faculties  become  en- 
larged. 

The  evil  that  has  resulted  from  the  error  of  the  schools,  in 
teaching  natural  philosophy  as  an  accomplishment  only,  has 
been  that  of  generating  in  the  pupils  a  species  of  atheism. 
Instead  of  looking  through  the  works  of  the  Creation  to  the 
Creator  himself,  they  stop  short,  and  employ  the  knowledge 
they  acquire  to  create  doubts  of  his  existence.  They  labour 
with  studied  ingenuity  to  ascribe  every  thing  they  behold  to 
innate  properties  of  matter ;  and  jump  over  all  the  rest,  by 
saying,  that  matter  is  eternal. 

Let  us  examine  this  subject;  it  is  worth  examining;  for 
if  we  examine  it  through  all  its  cases,  the  result  will  be, 
that  the  existence  of  a  superior  cause,  or  that  which  man 
calls  God,  will  be  discoverable  by  philosophical  principles. 

In  the  first  place,  admitting  matter  to  have  properties,  as 
we  see  it  has,  the  question  still  remains,  how  came  matter 
by  those  properties  ?  To  this  they  will  answer,  that  matter 
possessed  those  properties  eternally.  This  is  not  solution, 
but  assertion :  and  to  deny  it  is  equally  impossible  of  proof 
as  to  assert  it.  It  is  then  necessary  to  go  further;  and, 
therefore,  I  say,  if  there  exist  a  circumstance  that  is  not  a 
property  of  matter,  and  without  which  the  universe,  or,  to 
speak  in  a  limited  degree,  the  solar  system,  composed  of 
planets  and  a  sun,  could  not  exist  a  moment ;  all  the  argu- 
ments of  atheism,  drawn  from  properties  of  matter,  »-nd 
applied  to  account  for  the  universe,  will  be  overthrown,  and 
the  existence  of  a  superior  cause,  or  that  which  man  calls 
God,  becomes  discoverable,  as  is  before  said,  by  natural 
philosophy. 

I  go  now  to  show  that  such  a  circumstance  exists,  and  wnat 
it  is: 

The  universe  is  composed  of  matter,  and,  as  a  system,  ia 
sustained  by  motion.  Motion  is  not  a  property  of  matter, 
and  without  this  motion,  the  solar  system  could  not  exist. 
Were  motion  a  property  of  matter,  that  undiscovered  and 
undiscoverable  thing  called  perpetual  motion  would  establish 


OF  THEOPHTLANTHROPISTS.  283 

itse-f.  It  is  because  motion  is  not  a  property  of  matter  that 
perpetual  motion  is  an  impossibility  in  the  hand  of  every 
being  but  that  of  the  Creator  of  motion.  When  the  pre- 
tenders to  atheism  can  produce  perpetual  motion,  and  not 
till  then,  they  may  expect  to  be  credited. 

The  natural  state  of  matter,  as  to  place,  is  a  state  of  rest. 
Motion,  or  change  of  place,  is  the  effect  of  an  external  cause 
acting  upon  matter.  As  to  that  faculty  of  matter  that  is 
called  gravitation,  it  is  the  influence  which  two  or  more 
bodies  have  reciprocally  on  each  other  to  unite  and  to  be  at 
rest.  Every  thing  which  has  hitherto  been  discovered,  with 
respect  to  the  motion  of  the  planets  in  the  system,  relates 
only  to  the  laws  by  which  motion  acts,  and  not  to  the  cause 
of  motion.  Gravitation,  so  far  from  being  the  cause  of 
motion  to  the  planets  that  compose  the  solar  system,  would 
be  the  destruction  of  the  solar  system,  were  revolutionary 
motion  to  cease ;  for  as  the  action  of  spinning  upholds  a  top, 
the  revolutionary  motion  upholds  the  planets  in  their  orbits, 
and  prevents  them  from  gravitating  and  forming  one  mass 
with  the  sun.  In  one  sense  of  the  word,  philosophy  knows, 
and  atheism  says,  that  matter  is  in  perpetual  motion.  But 
motion  here  refers  to  the  state  of  matter,  and  that  only 
on  the  surface  of  the  earth.  It  is  either  decomposition, 
which  is  continually  destroying  the  form  of  bodies  of  mat- 
ter, or  re-composition,  which  renews  that  matter  in  the  same 
or  another  form,  as  the  decomposition  of  animal  or  vegeta- 
ble substances  enter  into  the  composition  of  other  bodies. 
But  the  motion  that  upholds  the  solar  system  is  of  an  entire 
different  kind,  and  is  not  a  property  of  matter.  It  operates 
also  to  an  entire  different  effect.  It  operates  to  perpetual 
preservation,  and  to  prevent  any  change  in  the  state  of  the 
system. 

Giving  then  to  matter  all  the  properties  which  philosophy 
knows  it  has,  or  all  that  atheism  ascribes  to  it,  and  can 
prove,  and  even  supposing  matter  to  be  eternal,  it  will  not 
account  for  the  system  of  the  universe,  or  of  the  solar 
system,  because  it  will  not  account  for  motion,  and  it  ia 
motion  that  preserves  it.  When,  therefore,  we  discover  a 
circumstance  of  such  immense  importance,  that  without  it 
the  universe  could  not  exist,  and  for  which  neither  matter, 
nor  any,  nor  all  the  properties  of  matter  can  account ;  we 
are  by  necessity  forced  into  the  rational  and  comfortable 
belief  of  the  existence  of  a  cause  superior  to  matter,  and 
that  cause  man  calls  God. 


284:  DISCOURSE   TO   THE   SOCIETY 

As  to  that  which  is  called  nature,  it  is  no  other  than  th< 
laws  by  which  motion  and  action  of  every  kind,  with  respect 
to  unintelligible  matter  is  regulated.  And  when  we  speak 
of  looking  through  nature  up  to  nature's  God,  we  speak  phi- 
losophically the  same  rational  language  as  when  we  speak 
of  looking  through  human  laws  up  to  the  power  that 
ordained  them. 

God  is  the  power  or  first  cause,  nature  is  the  law,  and 
matter  is  the  subject  acted  upon. 

But  infidelity,  by  ascribing  every  phenomenon  to  proper- 
ties of  matter,  conceives  a  system  for  which  it  cannot  ac-. 
count,  and  yet  it  pretends  to  demonstration.  It  reasons 
from  what  it  sees  on  the  surface  of  the  earth,  but  it  does  not 
carry  itself  to  the  solar  system  existing  by  motion.  It  sees 
upon  the  surface  a  perpetual  decomposition  and  re-composi- 
tion of  matter.  It  sees  that  an  oak  produces  an  acorn,  an 
acorn  an  oak,  a  bird  an  egg,  an  egg  a  bird,  and  so  on.  In 
things  of  this  kind  it  sees  something  which  it  calls  natural 
cause,  but  none  of  the  causes  it  sees  is  the  cause  of  that 
motion  which  preserves  the  solar  system. 

Let  us  contemplate  this  wonderful  and  stupendous  system 
consisting  of  matter  and  existing  by  motion.  It  is  not  mat- 
ter in  a  state  of  rest,  nor  in  a  state  of  decomposition  or 
re-composition.  It  is  matter  systematized  in  perpetual  orbi- 
cular or  circular  motion.  As  a  system  that  motion  is  the 
life  of  it,  as  animation  is  life  to  an  animal  body ;  deprive 
the  system  of  motion,  and,  as  a  system,  it  must  expire. 
Who  then  breathed  into  the  system  the  life  of  motion  ? 
What  power  impelled  the  planets  to  move,  since  motion  is 
not  a  property  of  the  matter  of  which  they  are  composed  ? 
If  we  contemplate  the  immense  velocity  of  this  motion,  our 
wonder  becomes  increased,  and  our  adoration  enlarges  itself 
in  the  same  proportion.  To  instance  only  one  of  the 
planets,  that  of  the  earth  we  inhabit,  its  distance  from  the 
sun,  the  centre  of  the  orbits  of  all  the  planets,  is,  according 
to  observations  of  the  transit  of  the  planet  Venus,  about  one 
hundred  million  miles ;  consequently,  the  diameter  of  the 
orbit,  or  circle  in  which  the  earth  moves  round  the  sun,  is 
double  that  distance ;  and  the  measure  of  the  circumference 
of  the  orbit,  taken  as  three  times  its  diameter,  is  six  hundred 
million  miles.  The  earth  performs  this  voyage  in  365  days 
and  some  hours,  and  consequently  moves  at  the  rate  of 
more  than  one  million  six  hundred  thousand  miles  every 
twenty-four  iio;r.s. 


OF   THEOPHTLANTHBOPISTS.  285 

WTiere  will  infidelity,  where  will  atheism  find  cause  for 
this  astonishing  velocity  of  motion,  never  ceasing,  never 
varying,  and  which  is  the  preservation  of  the  eartn  in  its 
orbit  ?  It  is  not  by  reasoning  from  an  acorn  to  an  oak,  or 
from  any  change  in  the  state  of  matter  on  the  surface  of  the 
earth,  that  this  can  be  accounted  for.  Its  cause  is  not  to 
be  found  in  matter,  nor  in  any  thing  we  call  nature.  The 
atheist  who  affects  to  reason,  and  tne  fanatic  who  rejects 
reason,  plunge  themselves  alike  into  inextricable  difficulties. 
The  one  perverts  the  sublime  and  enlightening  study  of 
natural  philosophy  into  a  deformity  of  absurdities  by  not 
reasoning  to  the  end.  The  other  loses  himself  in  the  obscu- 
rity of  metaphysical  theories,  and  dishonours  the  Creator, 
by  treating  the  study  of  his  works  with  contempt.  The  one 
is  a  half-rational  of  whom  there  is  some  hope,  the  other  a 
visionary  to  whom  we  must  be  charitable. 

When  at  first  thought  we  think  of  the  Creator,  our  ideas 
appear  to  us  undefined  and  confused ;  but  if  we  reason  phi- 
losophically, those  ideas  can  be  easily  arranged  and  simpli- 
fied. It  is  a  Being  whose  power  is  equal  to  Ms  will. 
Observe  the  nature  of  the  will  of  man.  It  is  of  an  infinite 
quality.  We  cannot  conceive  the  possibility  of  limits  to  the 
will.  Observe  on  the  other  hand,  how  exceedingly  limited 
is  his  power  of  acting,  compared  with  the  nature  of  his  will. 
Suppose  the  power  equal  to  the  will,  and  man  would  be  a 
God.  He  would  will  himself  eternal,  and  be  so.  He  could 
will  a  creation,  and  could  make  it.  In  this  progressive 
reasoning,  we  see  in  the  nature  of  the  will  of  man,  half  of 
that  which  we  conceive  of  thinking  of  God ;  add  the  other 
half,  and  we  have  the  whole  idea  of  a  being  who  could 
make  the  universe,  and  sustain  it  by  perpetual  motion  ; 
because  he  could  create  that  motion. 

We  know  nothing  of  the  capacity  of  the  will  of  animals, 
but  we  know  a  great  deal  of  the  difference  of  their  powers. 
For  example,  how  numerous  are  their  degrees,  and  how 
immense  is  the  difference  of  power  from  a  mite  to  a  man. 
Since  then  every  thing  we  see  below  us  shows  a  progression 
of  power,  where  is  the  difficulty  in  supposing  that  there  is, 
at  the  summit  of  all  things,  a  feeing  in  whom  an  infinity  of 
power  unites  with  the  infinity  of  the  will.  When  this  sim- 
ple idea  presents  itself  to  our  mind,  we  have  the  idea  of  a 
perfect  Being  that  man  calls  God. 

It  is  comfortable  to  live  under  the  belief  of  the  existence 
of  an  infinitely  protecting  power  ;  and  it  ie  an  addition  to 


286  DISCOURSE  TO  THE  SOCIETY 

that  comfort  to  know  that  such  a  belief  is  not  a  mere  con- 
ceit of  the  imagination,  as  many  of  the  theories  that  are 
called  religious  are ;  nor  a  belief  founded  only  on  tradition 
or  received  opinion,  but  is  a  belief  deducible  by  the  action 
of  reason  upon  the  things  that  compose  the  system  of  the 
universe :  a  belief  arising  out  of  visible  facts :  and  so  de- 
monstrable is  the  truth  of  this  belief,  that  if  no  such  belief 
had  existed,  the  persons  who  now  controvert  it,  would  have 
been  the  persons  who  would  have  produced  and  propagated 
it,  because,  by  beginning  to  reason,  they  would  have  been 
led  on  to  reason  progressively  to  the  end,  and,  thereby,  have 
discovered  that  matter  and  all  the  properties  it  has,  will  not 
account  for  the  system  of  the  universe,  and  that  there  must 
•necessarily  be  a  superior  cause. 

It  was  the  excess  to  which  imaginary  systems  of  religion 
had  been  carried,  and  the  intolerance,  persecutions,  burnings 
and  massacres,  they  occasioned,  that  first  induced  certain 
persons  to  propagate  infidelity;  thinking,  that  upon  the 
whole  it  was  better  not  to  believe  at  all,  than  to  believe  a 
multitude  of  things  and  complicated  creeds,  that  occasioned 
so  much  mischief  in  the  world.  But  those  days  are  past : 
persecution  has  ceased,  and  the  antidote  then  set  up  against 
it  has  no  longer  even  the  shadow  of  an  apology.  We  pro- 
fess, and  we  proclaim  in  peace,  the  pure,  unmixed,  comforta- 
ble, and  rational  belief  of  a  God,  as  manifested  to  us  in  the 
universe.  We  do  this  without  any  apprehension  of  that 
belief  being  made  a  cause  of  persecution  as  other  beliefs 
have  been,  or  of  suffering  persecution  ourselves.  To  God, 
and  not  to  man,  are  all  men  to  account  for  their  belief. 

It  has  been  well  observed  at  the  first  institution  of  this 
society  that  the  dogmas  it  professes  to  believe,  are  from  the 
commencement  of  the  world ;  that  they  are  not  novelties, 
but  are  confessedly  the  basis  of  all  systems  of  religion,  how- 
ever numerous  and  contradictory  they  may  be.  All  men  in 
the  outset  of  the  religion  they  profess  are  Theophilanthro- 
pists.  It  is  impossible  to  form  any  system  of  religion  without 
building  upon  those  principles,  and,  therefore,  they  are  not 
sectarian  principles,  unless  we  suppose  a  sect  composed  ol 
all  the  world. 

I  have  said  in  the  course  of  this  discourse,  that  the  study 
of  natural  philosophy  is  a  divine  study,  because  it  is  the 
study  of  the  works  01  God  in  the  Creation.  If  we  consider 
theology  upon  this  ground,  what  an  extensive  field  of  im- 
provement in  things  both  divine  and  human  opens  itself 


OF  THEOPHILANTHROPI8T8.  287 

before  us.  All  the  principles  of  science  are  of  divine  origin. 
It  was  not  man  that  invented  the  principles  on  which  astro- 
nomy, and  every  branch  of  mathematics  are  founded  and 
studied.  It  was  not  man  that  gave  properties  of  the  circle 
and  triangle.  Those  principles  are  eternal  and  immutable. 
We  see  in  them  the  unchangeable  nature  of  the  Divinity. 
We  see  in  them  immortality,  an  immortality  existing  after 
the  material  figures  that  express  those  properties  are  dis- 
solved in  dust. 

The  society  is  at  present  in  its  infancy,  and  its  means  are 
small ;  but  I  wish  to  hold  in  view  the  subject  I  allude  to,  and 
instead  of  teaching  the  philosophical  branches  of  learning 
as  ornamental  accomplishments  only,  as  they  have  hitherto 
been  taught,  to  teach  them  in  a  manner  that  shall  combine 
theological  knowledge  with  scientific  instruction ;  to  do  this 
to  the  best  advantage,  some  instruments  will  be  necessary 
for  the  purpose  of  explanation,  of  which  the  society  is  not 
yet  possessed.  But  as  the  views  of  the  society  extend  to 
public  good,  as  well  as  to  that  of  the  individual,  and  as  its 
principles  can  have  no  enemies,  means  may  be  devised  to 
procure  them. 

If  we  unite  to  the  present  instruction,  a  series  of  lectures 
on  the  ground  I  have  mentioned,  we  shall,  in  the  first  place, 
render  theology  the  most  delightful  and  entertaining  of  all 
studies.  In  the  next  place  we  shall  give  scientific  instruction 
to  those  who  could  not  otherwise  obtain  it.  The  mechanic 
of  every  profession  will  there  be  taught  the  mathematical 
principles  necessary  to  render  him  a  proficient  in  his  art. 
The  cultivator  will  there  see  developed,  the  principles  of 
vegetation :  while,  at  the  same  time,  they  will  oe  lea  to  see 
the  hand  of  God  in  all  these  things. 


EEMABKS    ON 

ROBERT   HALL'S  SERMONS. 


Kobert  Hall,  a  protestant  minister  in  England,  preached 
and  published  a  sermon  against  what  he  calls  "  Modern  in- 
fidelity" A  copy  of  it  was  sent  to  a  gentleman  in  America, 
with  a  request  for  his  opinion  thereon.  That  gentleman 
sent  it  to  a  friend  of  his  in  New- York,  with  the  request 
written  on  the  cover — and  this  last  sent  it  to  Thomas  Paine, 
who  wrote  the  following  observations  on  the  blank  leaf  at 
the  end  of  the  sermon. 

The  preacher  of  the  foregoing  sermon  speaks  a  great  deal 
about  ^nfidelity,  but  does  not  define  what  he  means  by  it. 
His  harangue  is  a  general  exclamation.  Every  thing,  I 
suppose,  that  is  not  in  his  creed  is  infidelity  with  him,  and  his 
creed  is  infidelity  with  me.  Infidelity  is  believing  falsely. 
If  what  Christians  believe  is  not  true,  it  is  the  Christians  that 
are  the  infidels. 

The  point  between  deists  and  Christians  is  not  about  doc- 
trine, but  about  facts — for  if  the  things  believed  by  the 
Christians  to  be  facts,  are  not  facts,  the  doctrine  founded 
thereon  falls  of  itself.  There  is  such  a  book  as  the  Bible, 
but  is  it  a  fact  that  the  bible  is  revealed  religion  f  The 
Christians  cannot  prove  it  is.  They  put  tradition  in  place  of 
evidence,  and  tradition  is  not  procf.  If  it  were,  the  reality 
of  witches  could  be  proved  by  the  same  kind  of  evidence. 

The  bible  is  a  history  of  the  times  of  which  it  speaks,  and 
history  is  not  revelation.  The  onscene  and  vulgar  stories  in 
the  bible  are  as  repugnant  to  our  ideas  of  the  purity  of  a 
divine  Being,  as  the  horrid  cruelties  and  murders  it  ascribes 
to  him,  are  repugnant  to  our  ideas  of  his  justice.  It  is  the 
reverence  of  the  Deists  for  the  attributes  of  the  DEITY,  that 
causes  them  to  reject  the  bible. 

Is  the  account  which  the  Christian  church  gives  of  the 
person  called  Jesus  Christ,  a  fact  or  a  fable  ?  Is  it  a  fact 
that  he  was  begotten  by  the  Holy  Ghost  ?  The  Christians 
cannot  prove  it,  for  the  case  does  not  admit  of  proof.  The 
things  called  miracles  in  the  bible,  such,  for  instance,  as 
"asa 


REMARKS   ON    R.    HALL'S   SERMONS.  289 

-aisiug  the  dead,  admitted,  if  true,  of  ocular  demonstration, 
but  the  story  of  the  conception  of  Jesus  Christ  in  the  womb 
is  a  case  beyond  miracle,  tor  it  did  not  admit  of  demonstra- 
tion. Mary,  the  reputed  mother  of  Jesus,  who  must  be  sup- 
posed to  know  best,  never  said  so  herself,  and  all  the  evidence 
of  it  is,  that  the  book  of  Matthew  says,  that  Joseph  dreamed 
an  angel  told  him  BO.  Had  an  old  maid  of  two  or  three 
hundred  years  of  age,  brought  forth  a  child,  it  would  have 
been  much  better  presumptive  evidence  of  a  supernatural 
conception,  than  Matthew  s  story  of  Joseph's  dream  about 
his  young  wife. 

Is  it  a  fact  that  Jesus  Christ  died  for  the  sins  of  the  world, 
and  how  is  it  proved  ?  If  a  God  he  could  not  die,  and  as  a 
man  he  coula  not  redeem,  how  then  is  this  redemption 
proved  to  be  fact  ?  It  is  said  that  Adam  eat  of  the  forbidden 
fruit,  commonly  called  an  apple,  and  thereby  subjected  him- 
self and  all  his  posterity  for  ever  to  eternal  damnation. 
This  is  worse  than  visiting  the  sins  of  the  fathers  upon  the 
children  unto  the  third  and  fourth  generations.  But  how 
was  the  death  of  Jesus  Christ  to  affect  or  alter  the  case  ? — 
Did  God  thirst  for  blood  ?  If  so,  would  it  not  have  been 
better  to  have  crucified  Adam  at  once  upon  the  forbidden 
tree,  and  made  a  new  man?  Would  not  this  have  been 
more  creator  like  than  repairing  the  old  one  ?  Or,  did  God, 
when  he  made  Adam,  supposing  the  story  to  be  true,  exclude 
himself  from  the  right  of  making  another  ?  Or  impose  on 
himself  the  necessity  of  breeding  from  the  old  stock  ?  JPriests 
should  first  prove  facts,  and  deduce  doctrines  from  them 
afterwards.  JBut,  instead  of  this,  they  assume  every  thing 
and  prove  nothing.  Authorities  drawn  from  the  bible  are 
no  more  than  authorities  drawn  from  other  books,  unless  it 
can  be  proved  that  the  bible  is  revelation. 

This  story  of  the  redemption  will  not  stand  examination. 
That  man  should  redeem  nimself  from  the  sin  of  eating  an 
apple,  by  committing  a  murder  on  Jesus  Christ,  is  the 
strangest  system  of  religion  ever  set  up.  Deism  is  perfect 
purity  compared  with  this.  It  is  an  established  principle 
with  the  quakers  not  to  shed  blood — suppose,  then,  all  Jeru- 
salem had  been  quakers  when  Christ  lived,  there  would  have 
been  nobody  to  crucify  him,  and  in  that  case,  if  man  is  re- 
deemed by  his  blood,  which  is  the  belief  of  the  church,  there 
could  have  been  no  redemption — and  the  people  of  Jerusa- 
lem maist  all  have  been  damned,  because  they  were  too  good 
to  commit  murder.  The  Christian  system  of  religion  is 

13 


290  OP  THE   WORD   RELIGION. 

an   outrage    on   common  sense.     Why  is  man   afraid  to 
think? 

Why  do  not  the  Christians,  to  be  consistent,  make  sainti 
of  Judas  and  Pontius  Pilate,  for  they  were  the  persons  who 
accomplished  the  act  of  salvation.  The  merit  of  a  sacrifice, 
if  there  can  be  any  merit  in  it,  was  never  in  the  'thing 
sacrificed,  but  in  the  persons  offering  up  the  sacrifice — and, 
therefore,  Judas  and  Pontius  Pilate  ought  to  stand  first  on 
the  calendar  of  saints. 

THOMAS  PAINE. 


AND  OTHER  WORDS  OF   UNCERTAIN   SIGNIFICATION. 


THE  word  religion  is  a  word  of  forced  application  when 
used  with  respect  to  the  worship  of  God.  The  root  of  the 
word  is  the  latin  verb  ligo,  to  tie  or  bind.  From  ligo,  comes 
religO)  to  tie  or  bind  over  again,  or  make  more  fast — from 
religo,  comes  substantive  reUgio,  which,  with  the  addition  of 
n  makes  the  English  substantive  religion.  The  French  use 
the  word  properly — when  a  woman  enters  a  convent  she  is 
called  a  noviciat,  that  is,  she  is  upon  trial  or  probation. 
When  she  takes  the  oath,  she  called  a  religieuse,  that  is,  she 
is  tied  or  bound  by  that  oath  to  the  performance  of  it.  We 
use  the  word  in  the  same  kind  of  sense  when  we*  say  we  will 
religiously  perform  the  promise  that  we  make. 

But  the  word,  without  referring  to  its  etymology,  has,  in 
the  marmer  it  is  used,  no  definitive  meaning,  because  it  does 
not  designate  what  religion  a  man  is  of.  There  is  the  reli- 

fion  of  the  Chinese,  of  the  Tartars,  of  the  Bramins,  of  the 
ersians,  of  the  Jews,  of  the  Turks,  etc. 
The  word  Christianity  is  equally  as  vague  as  the  word  re- 
ligion.    IsTo  two  sectaries  can  agree  what  it  is.     It  is  a  lo 
here  and  lo  there.    The  two  principal  sectaries,  Papists  and 
Protestants,  have  often  cut  each  other's  throats  about  it  :— 
The  Papists  caH  the  Protestants  heretics,  and  the  Protestants 


OF   THE   WORD   EELIGION.  291 

call  the  Papists  idolaters.  The  minor  sectaries  have  shown 
the  same  spirit  of  rancour,  but,  as  the  civil  law  restrains 
them  from  blood,  they  content  themselves  with  preaching 
damnation  against  eacn  other. 

The  word  protestant  has  a  positive  signification  in  the 
sense  it  is  used.  It  means  protesting  against  the  authority 
of  the  Pope,  and  this  is  the  only  article  in  which  the  pro- 
testants  agree. — In  every  other  sense,  with  respect  to  reli- 
gion, the  word  protestant  is  as  vague  as  the  word  Christian. 
When  we  say  an  episcopalian,  a  presbyterian,  a  baptist,  a 
quaker,  we  know  what  those  persons  are,  and  what  tenets 
tney  hold — but  when  we  say  a  Christian,  we  know  he  is  not 
a  Jew  nor  a  Mahometan,  but  we  know  not  if  he  be  a  trini- 
tarian  or  an  anti-trinitarian,  a  believer  in  what  is  called  the 
immaculate  conception,  or  a  disbeliever,  a  man  of  seven  sa- 
craments, or  of  two  sacraments,  or  of  none.  The  word 
Christian  describes  what  a  man  is  not,  but  not  what  he  is. 

The  word  Theology r,  from  Theos,  the  Greek  word  for  God, 
and  meaning  the  study  and  knowledge  of  God,  is  a  word, 
that  strictly  speaking,  belongs  to  Theists  or  Deists,  and  not 
to  the  Christians.  The  head  of  the  Christian  church  is  vne 
person  called  Christ — but  the  head  of  the  ehurch  of  the 
Theists,  or  Deists,  as  they  are  more  commonly  called,  from 
Deus,  the  latin  word  for  God,  is  God  himself,  and  therefore 
the  word  Theology  belongs  to  that  church  which  has  Theos, 
or  God,  for  its  head,  and  not  to  the  Christian  church  which 
has  the  person  called  Christ  for  its  head.  Their  technical 
word  is  Christianity,  and  they  cannot  agree  what  Christ- 
ianity is. 

The  words  revealed  religion,  and  natural  religion,  require 
also  explanation.  They  are  both  invented  terms,  contrived 
by  the  church  for  the  support  of  priestcraft.  With  respect 
to  the  first,  there  is  no  evidence  of  any  such  thing,  except 
in  the  universal  revelation  that  God  has  made  of  his  power, 
his  wisdom,  his  goodness,  in  the  structure  of  the  universe, 
and  in  all  the  works  of  creation.  We  have  no  cause  or 
ground  from  any  thing  we  behold  in  those  works,  to  suppose 
God  would  deal  partially  by  mankind,  and  reveal  knowledge 
to  one  nation  and  withhold  it  from  another,  and  then  damn 
them  for  not  knowing  it.  The  sun  shines  an  equal  quantity 
of  light  all  over  the  world — and  mankind  in  all  ages  and 
countries  are  endued  with  reason,  and  blessed  with  sight,  to 
read  the  visible  works  of  God  in  the  creation,  and  so  intelli- 
gent is  this  book  that  he  that  runs  may  read.  We  admire 


292  OF   THE    WORD   RELIGION 

the  wisdom  of  the  ancients,  yet  they  had  no  bibles,  noi 
books,  called  revelation.  They  cultivated  the  reason  that 
God  gave  them,  studied  him  in  his  works,  and  arose  to 
eminence. 

As  to  the  Bible,  whether  true  or  fabulous,  it  is  a  history 
and  history  is  not  revelation.  If  Solomon  had  seven  hun- 
dred wives,  and  three  hundred  concubines,  and  if  Samson 
slept  in  Delilah's  lap,  and  she  cut  his  hair  off,  the  relation 
of  those  things  is  mere  history,  that  needed  no  revelation 
from  heaven  to  tell  it ;  neither  does  it  need  any  revelation 
to  tell  us  that  Samson  was  a  fool  for  his  pains,  and  Solo- 
mon too. 

As  to  the  expressions  so  often  used  in  the  Bible,  that  the 
word  of  the  Lord  came  to  such  an  one,  or  such  an  one,  it 
was  the  fashion  of  speaking  in  those  times,  like  the  express- 
ion used  by  a  quaker,  that  the  spirit  moveth  him,  or  that 
used  by  priests,  that  they  have  a  call.  "We  ought  not  to  be 
deceived  by  phrases  because  they  are  ancient.  But  if  we 
admit  the  supposition  that  God  would  condescend  to  reveal 
himself  in  words  we  ought  not  to  believe  it  would  be  in  such 
idle  and  profligate  stories  as  are  in  the  Bible,  and  it  is  for 
this  reason,  among  others  which  our  reverence  to  God  in- 
spires, that  the  Deists  deny  that  the  book  called  the  Bible  is 
the  word  of  God,  or  that  it  is  revealed  religion. 

With  respect  to  the  term  natural  religion,  it  is,  upon  the 
face-  of  it,  trie  opposite  of  artificial  religion,  and  it  is  impos- 
sible for  any  man  to  be  certain  that  what  is  called  revealed 
religion,  is  not  artificial.  Man  has  the  power  of  making 
books,  inventing  stories  of  God,  and  calling  them  revelation, 
or  the  word  of  God.  The  Koran  exists  as  an  instance  that 
this  can  be  done,  and  we  must  be  credulous  indeed  to  sup- 
pose that  this  is  the  only  instance,  and  Mahomet  the  only 
impostor.  The  Jews  could  match  him,  and  the  church  of 
Rome  could  overmatch  the  Jews.  The  Mahometans  believe 
the  Koran,  the  Christians  believe  the  Bible,  and  it  is  educa- 
tion makes  all  the  difference. 

Books,  whether  Bibles  or  Korans,  carry  no  evidence  of 
being  the  work  of  any  other  power  than  man.  It  is  only 
that  which  man  cannot  do  that  carries  the  evidence  of  being 
the  work  of  a  superior  power.  Man  could  not  invent  and 
make  a  universe — he  could  not  invent  nature,  for  nature  is 
of  divine  origin.  It  is  the  laws  by  which  the  universe  is 
governed.  When,  therefore,  we  look  through  nature  up  to 
nature's  God,  we  are  in  the  right  road  of  happiness,  but 


OF  CAIN   AND    ABEL.  293 

when  we  trust  to  books  as  the  word  of  God,  and  confide  in 
them  as  revealed  religion,  we  are  afloat  on  the  ocean  of 
uncertainty,  and  shatter  into  contending  factions.  The  term 
therefore,  natural  religion,  explains  itself  to  be  divine  reli- 
gion^ and  the  term  revealed  religion  involves  in  it  the  suspi- 
cion of  being  artificial. 

To  show  tne  necessity  of  understanding  the  meaning  of 
words,  I  will  mention  an  instance  of  a  minister,  I  believe  of 
the  episcopalian  church  of  Newark,  in  Jersey  He  wrote 
and  published  a  book,  and  entitled  it,  "  An  Antidote  to 
Deism.1'1  An  antidote  to  Deism,  must  be  Atheism.  It  haa 
no  other  antidote — for  what  can  be  an  antidote  to  the  belief 
of  a  God,  but  the  disbelief  of  God.  Under  the  tuition  of 
such  pastors,  what  but  ignorance  and  false  information  can 
be  expected.  T.  P. 


OF  CAIN  AND  ABEL. 


The  story  of  Cain  and  Abel  is  told  in  the  fourth  chapter 
of  Genesis;  Cain  was  the  elder  brother,  and  Abel  the 
younger,  and  Cain  killed  Abel.  The  Egyptian  story  of 
Typhon  and  Osiris,  and  the  Jewish  story,  in  Genesis,  of  Cain 
and  Abel,  have  the  appearance  of  being  the  same  story  dif- 
ferently told,  and  that  it  came  originally  from  Egypt. 

In  the  Egyptian  story,  Typhon  and  Osiris  are  brothers ; 
Tvphon  is  tne  elder,  and  Osiris  the  younger,  and  Typhon 
kills  Osiris.  The  story  is  an  allegory  on  darkness  and  light ; 
Typhon,  the  elder  brother,  is  darkness,  because  darkness  was 
supposed  to  be  more  ancient  than  light :  Osiris  is  the  good 
light  who  rules  during  the  summer  months,  and  brings  forth 
the  fruits  of  the  earth,  and  is  the  favorite,  as  Abel  is  said  to 
have  been,  for  which  Typhon  hates  him ;  aaid  when  the 
winter  conies,  and  cold  and  darkness  overspread  the  earth, 
Typhon  is  represented  as  having  killed  Osiris  out  of  malice, 
as  Cain  is  said  to  have  killed  Abel. 

The  two  stories  are  alike  in  their  circumstances  and  their 
bu  t  the  same  story ;  what  corroborates 
e  f  fth  chapter  of  Genesis  historically 


event,  and  are  probably 
this  opinion,  is,  that  th 


294:  THE   TOWKE   OF   BABEL. 

contradicts  the  reality  of  the  story  of  Cain  and  Abel  in  the 
fourth  chapter,  for  though  the  name  of  Seth,  a  son  of  Adam, 
is  mentioned  in  the  fourth  chapter,  he  is  spoken  of  in  the 
fifth  chapter  as  if  he  was  the  first  born  of  Adam.  The  chap- 
ter begins  thus : — 

"  This  is  the  book  of  the  generations  of  Adam.  In  the  day 
that  God  created  man,  in  the  likeness  of  God  created  he  him. 
Male  and  female  created  he  them,  and  blessed  them,  and 
called  their  name  Adam  in  the  day  when  they  were  created. 
And  Adam  lived  an  hundred  and  thirty  years  and  begat  a 
son,  in  his  own  likeness  and  after  his  own  image,  and  called 
his  name  Seth"  The  rest  of  the  chapter  goes  on  with  the 
genealogy. 

Any  body  reading  this  chapter,  cannot  suppose  there  were 
any  sons  born  before  Seth.  The  chapter  begins  with  what  is 
called  the  creation  of  Adam,  and  calls  itself  the  book  of  the 
generations  of  Adam,  yet  no  mention  is  made  of  such  per- 
sons  as  Cain  and  Abel ;  one  thing,  however,  is  evident  on 
the  face  of  these  two  chapters,  which  is,  that  the  same  per- 
son is  not  the  writer  of  both ;  the  most  blundering  historian 
could  not  have  committed  himself  in  such  a  manner. 

Though  I  look  on  every  thing  in  the  first  ten  chapters  of 
Genesis  to  be  fiction,  yet  fiction  historically  told  should  be 
consistent,  whereas  these  two  chapters  are  not.  The  Cain 
and  Abel  of  Genesis  appear  to  be  no  other  than  the  ancient 
Egyptian  story  of  Typhon  and  Osiris,  the  darkness  and  the 
light,  which  answered  very  well  as  an  allegory  without 
being  believed  as  a  fact. 


THE    TOWER    OF    BABEL. 


THE  story  of  the  tower  of  Babel  is  told  in  the  eleventh 
chapter  of  Genesis.  It  begins  thus : — "  And  the  whole 
earth  (it  was  but  a  very  little  part  of  it  they  knew)  was  of 
one  language  and  of  one  speech. — And  it  came  to  pass  as 
they  journeyed  from  the  east,  that  they  found  a  plain  in  the 
land  of  Shmar,  and  they  dwelt  there. — And  they  said  one 
to  another  Go  to,  let  us  make  brick  and  burn  them 


THE   TOWER   OF   BABEL.  295 

thoroughly,  and  they  had  brick  for  stone,  and  slime  had 
they  for  mortar. — And  they  said  go  to,  let  us  build  us  a  city, 
and  a  tower  whose  top  may  reach  unto  heaven,  and  let  u, 
make  us  a  name,  lest  we  be  scattered  abroad  upon  the  face 
of  the  whole  earth. — And  the  Lord  came  down  to  see  tho 
city  arid  the  tower  which  the  children  of  men  builded. — 
And  the  Lord  said,  behold  the  people  is  one,  and  they  have 
all  one  language,  and  this  they  begin  to  do,  and  now 
nothing  wifi  be  restrained  from  them  which  they  have 
imagined  to  do. — Go  to,  let  us  go  down  and  there  confound 
their  language,  that  they  may  not  understand  one  another's 
speech. — So  (that  is,  by  that  means)  the  Lord  scattered  them 
abroad  from  thence  upon  the  face  of  all  the  earth,  and  they 
left  off  building  the  city." 

This  is  the  story,  and  a  very  foolish  inconsistent  story  it 
is.  In  the  first  place,  the  familiar  and  irreverend  manner 
in  which  the  Almighty  is  spoken  of  in  this  chapter,  is  offen- 
sive to  a  serious  mind.  As  to  the  project  of  building  a 
tower  whose  top  should  reach  to  heaven,  there  never  could 
be  a  people  so  foolish  as  to  have  such  a  notion;  but  to  re- 
present the  Almighty  as  jealous  of  the  attempt,  as  the 
writer  of  the  story  has  done,  is  adding  profanation  to  folly. 
"  Go  to"  says  the  builders,  " let  us  build  us  a  tower  whose 
top  shall  reach  to  heaven."  "  Go  to"  says  God,  "  let  us 
go  down  and  confound  their  language."  This  quaintness  is 
indecent,  and  the  reason  given  for  it  is  worse,  for,  "  now 
nothing  will  be  restrained  from  them  which  they  have 
imagined  to  do."  This  is  representing  the  Almighty  as 
jealous  of  their  getting  into  heaven.  The  story  is  too  ridi- 
culous, even  as  a  fable,  to  account  for  the  diversity  of  lan- 
guages in  the  world,  for  which  it  seems  to  have  been 
intended. 

As  to  the  project  of  confounding  their  language  for  the 
purpose  of  making  them  separate,  is  altogether  inconsistent ; 
because,  instead  of  producing  this  effect,  it  would,  by  in- 
creasing their  difficulties,  render  them  more  necessary  to 
each  other,  and  cause  them  to  keep  together.  Where  could 
thev  go  to  better  themselves  ? 

Another  observation  upon  this  story  is,  the  inconsistency 
of  it  with  respect  to  the  opinion  that  the  bible  is  the  word 
of  God  given  for  the  information  of  mankind  ;  for  nothing 
could  so  effectually  prevent  such  a  word  being  known  by 
mankind  as  confounding  their  language.  The  people,  who 
after  this  spoke  different  languages,  could  no  more  under 


296  OF  THE   EELIGION   OF   DEISM,   ETC. 

stand  such  a  word  generally,  than  the  builders  of  Babel 
could  understand  one  another.  It  would  have  been  neces- 
sary, therefore,  had  such  word  ever  been  given  or  intended 
to  be  given,  that  the  whole  earth  should  be,  as  they  say  it 
was  at  first,  of  -jne  language  and  of  one  speech,  and  that  it 
should  never  have  been  confounded. 

The  case,  however,  is,  that  the  bible  will  not  bear  exami- 
nation in  any  part  of  it,  which  it  would  do  if  it  was  the 
word  of  God.  Those  who  most  believe  it  are  those  who 
know  least  about  it,  and  priests  always  take  care  to  keep 
the  inconsistent  and  contradictory  parts  out  of  sight. 

T.  P. 


OF  THE  RELIGION  OF  DEISM 

COMPARED   WITH    THE   CHRISTIAN    RELIGION,    AND    THE 
SUPERIORITY  OF  THE  FORMER  OVER  THE  LATTER. 


EVEKT  person,  of  whatever  religious  denomination  he  may 
be,  is  a  DEIST  in  the  first  article  of  his  Creed.  Deism,  from 
the  Latin  word  Deus,  God,  is  the  belief  of  a  God,  and  this 
belief  is  the  first  article  of  every  man's  creed. 

It  is  on  this  article,  universally  consented  to  by  all  man- 
kind, that  the  Deist  builds  his  church,  and  here  he  rests. 
Whenever  we  step  aside  from  this  article,  by  mixing  it  with 
articles  of  human  invention,  we  wander  into  a  labyrinth  of 
uncertainty  and  fable  and  become  exposed  to  every  kind  of 
imposition  by  pretenders  to  revelation.  The  Persian  shows 
the  Zendavesta  of  Zoroaster,  the  law-giver  of  Persia,  and 
calls  it  the  divine  law ;  the  Bramin  shows  the  Shaster,  re- 
vealed, he  says,  by  God  to  Brama,  and  given  to  him  out  of 
a  cloud ;  the  Jew  shows  what  he  calls  the  law  of  Moses, 
given,  he  says,  by  God,  on  the  Mount  Sinai ;  the  Christian 
shows  a  collection  of  books  and  epistles,  written  by  nobody 
knows  who,  and  called  the  New  Testament;  and  the 
Mahometan  shows  the  Koran,  given,  he  says,  by  God  ta 
Mahomet :  each  of  these  calls  itself  revealed  religion,  and  the 
true  word  of  God,  and  this  the  followers  of  each  pro 


OF  THE   EELIGION    OF   DEISM,    BTO.  297 

fees  to  believe  from  the  habit  of  education,  and  each  believes 
the  others  are  imposed  upon. 

But  when  the  divine  gift  of  reason  begins  to  expand  iteeli 
in  the  mind  and  calls  man  to  reflection,  he  then  reads  and 
contemplates  God  in  his  works,  and  not  in  the  books  pre- 
tending to  be  revelation.  The  Creation  is  the  Bible  of  the 
true  believer  in  God.  Every  thing  in  this  vast  volume 
inspires  him  with  sublime  ideas  of  the  Creator.  The  little 
and  paltry,  and  often  obscene,  tales  of  the  bible  sink  into 
wretchedness  when  put  in  comparison  with  this  mighty  work. 
The  Deist  needs  none  of  those  tricks  and  shows  called  mira- 
cles to  confirm  his  faith,  for  what  can  be  a  greater  miracle 
than  the  creation  itself,  and  his  own  existence. 

There  is  a  happiness  in  Deism,  when  rightly  understood, 
that  is  not  to  be  found  in  any  other  system  of  religion.  All 
other  systems  have  some  things  in  them  that  either  shock  our 
reason,  or  are  repugnant  to  it,  and  man,  if  he  thinks  at  all,, 
must  stifle  his  reason  in  order  to  force  himself  to  believe 
them.  But  in  Deism  our  reason  and  our  belief  become  hap- 
pily united.  The  wonderful  structure  of  the  universe,  and 
every  thing  we  behold  in  the  system  of  the  creation,  prove 
to  us,  far  better  than  books  can  do,  the  existence  of  a  God, 
and  at  the  same  time  proclaim  his  attributes.  It  is  by  the 
exercise  of  our  reason  that  we  are  enabled  to  contemplate 
God  in  his  works,  and  imitate  him  in  his  ways.  When  we 
see  his  care  and  goodness  extended  over  all  his  creatures,  it 
teaches  us  our  duty  towards  each  other,  while  it  calls  forth 
our  gratitude  to  him.  It  is  by  forgetting  God  in  his  works, 
and  running  after  the  books  of  pretended  revelation  that 
man  has  wandered  from  the  straignt  path  of  duty  and  hap- 
piness, and  become  by  turns  the  victim  of  doubt  and  the 
aupe  of  delusion. 

Except  in  the  first  article  in  the  Christian  creed,  that  of 
believing  in  God,  there  is  not  an  article  in  it  but  fills  the 
mind  with  doubt,  as  to  the  truth  of  it,  the  instant  man  be- 
gins to  think.  Now  every  article  in  a  creed  that  is  necessary 
to  the  happiness  and  salvation  of  man,  ought  to  be  as  evident 
to  the  reason  and  comprehension  of  man  as  the  first  article  is, 
for  God  has  not  given  us  reason  for  the  purpose  of  confound- 
ing us,  but  that  we  should  use  it  for  our  own  happiness  and 
hisglory. 

The  truth  of  the  first  article  is  proved  by  God  himself,  and 
is  universal ;  for  f,he  creation  is  of  itself  demonstration  of 
the  existence  of  i  Creator.  But  the  second  article,  that  of 


298  OF  THE   RELIGION   OF   DEISM,    ETC. 

God's  begetting  a  son,  is  not  proved  in  like  manner,  and 
stands  on  no  other  authority  than  that  of  a  tale.  Certain 
books  in  what  is  called  the  New  Testament  tell  us  that 
Joseph  dreamed  that  the  angel  told  him  so.  (Matthew, 
chap.  1.  ver.  20.)  "  And  behold  the  Angel  of  the  Lord  ap- 
peared to  Joseph,  in  a  dream,  saying,  Joseph,  thou  son  of 
David,  fear  not  to  take  unto  thee  Mary  thy  wife,  for  that 
which  is  conceived  in  her  is  of  the  Holy  Ghost."  The  evi- 
dence upon  this  article  bears  no  comparison  with  the  evi- 
dence upon  the  first  article,  and  therefore  is  not  entitled  to 
the  same  credit,  and  ought  not  to  be  made  an  article  in  a 
creed,  because  the  evidence  of  it  is  defective,  and  what  evi- 
dence there  is,  is  doubtful  and  suspicious.  We  do  not  be- 
lieve the  first  article  on  the  authority  of  books,  whether 
called  Bibles  or  Koran  s,  nor  yet  on  the  visionary  authority 
of  dreams,  but  on  the  authority  of  God's  own  visible  works 
in  the  creation.  The  nations  who  never  heard  of  such  books, 
nor  of  such  people  as  Jews,  Christians,  or  Mahometans, 
believe  the  existence  of  a  God  as  fully  as  we  do,  because  it 
is  self  evident.  The  work  of  man's  hands  is  a  proof  of  the 
existence  of  man  as  fully  as  his  personal  appearance  would 
be.  When  we  see  a  watch,  we  have  as  positive  evidence  of 
the  existence  of  a  watch-maker,  as  if  we  saw  him ;  and  in 
like  manner  the  creation  is  evidence  to  our  reason  and  our 
senses  of  the  existence  of  a  Creator.  But  there  is  nothing 
in  the  works  of  God  that  is  evidence  that  he  begat  a  son, 
nor  any  thing  in  the  system  of  creation  that  corroborates 
such  an  idea,  and,  therefore,  we  are  not  authorized  in  believ- 
ingit. 

But  presumption  can  assume  any  thing,  and  therefore  it 
makes  Joseph's  dream  to  be  of  equal  authority  with  the  ex- 
istence of  God,  and  to  help  it  on  calls  it  revelation.  It  is 
impossible  for  the  mind  of  man  in  its  serious  moments,  how- 
ever it  may  have  been  entangled  by  education,  or  beset  by 
priest-craft,  not  to  stand  still  and  doubt  upon  the  truth  of 
this  article  and  of  its  creed.  But  this  is  not  all. 

The  second  article  of  the  Christian  creed  having  brought 
the  son  of  Mary  into  the  world,  (and  this  Mary,  according 
to  the  chronological  tables,  was  a  girl  of  only  fifteen  years  of 
ag-e  when  this  son  was  born,)  the  next  article  goes  on  to  ac- 
count for  his  being  begotten,  which  was,  that  when  he  grew 
a  man  he  should  be  put  to  death,  to  expiate,  they  say,  the 
sin  that  Adam  brought  into  the  world  by  eating  an  apple  or 
«oine  kind  of  forbidden  fruit- 


OF  THE   RELIGION   OF   DEISM,    ETO. 

But  though  this  is  the  creed  of  the  church  of  Rome,  from 
whence  the  protestants  borrowed  it,  it  is  a  creed  which  that 
church  has  manufactured  of  itself,  for  it  is  not  contained  in, 
nor  derived  from,  the  book  called  the  New  Testament.  The 
four  books  called  the  Evangelists,  Matthew,  Mark,  Luke  and 
John,  which  give,  or  pretend  to  give,  the  birth,  savings,  life, 
preaching  and  death  of  Jesus  Cnrist,  make  no  mention  of 
what  is  called  the  fall  of  man  ;  nor  is  the  name  of  Adam  to 
be  found  in  any  of  those  books,  which  it  certainly  would  be 
if  the  writers  of  them  believed  that  Jesus  was  begotten, 
born,  and  died  for  the  purpose  of  redeeming  mankind  from 
the  sin  which  Adam  had  brought  into  the  world.  Jesus 
never  speaks  of  Adam  himself,  of  the  Garden  of  Eden,  nor 
of  what  is  called  the  fall  of  man. 

But  the  Church  of  Rome  having  set  up  its  new  religion 
which  it  called  Christianity,  and  invented  the  creed  which 
it  named  the  apostle's  creed,  in  which  it  calls  Jesus  the  only 
son  of  God,  conceived  by  tlie  Holy  Ghost,  a/nd  lorn  of  the 
Virgin  Mary — things  of  which  it  is  impossible  that  man  or 
woman  can  have  any  idea,  and  consequently  no  belief  but 
in  words,  and  for  which  there  is  no  authority  but  the  idle 
story  of  Joseph's  dream  in  the  first  chapter  of  Matthew, 
which  any  designing  impostor  or  foolish  fanatic  might  make. 
It  then  manufactured  the  allegories  in  the  book  01  Genesis, 
into  fact,  and  the  allegorical  tree  of  life  and  the  tree  of 
knowledge  into  real  trees,  contrary  to  the  belief  of  the  first 
Christians,  and  for  which  there  is  not  the  least  authority  in 
any  of  the  books  of  the  New  Testament ;  for  in  none  of 
them  is  there  any  mention  made  of  such  place  as  the  Garden 
of  Eden,  nor  of  any  thing  that  is  said  to  have  happened 
there. 

But  the  church  of  Rome  could  not  erect  the  person  called 
Jesus  into  a  Saviour  of  the  world  without  making  the  alle- 
gories in  the  book  of  Genesis  into  fact,  though  the  New  Tes- 
tament, as  before  observed,  gives  no  authority  for  it.  All  at 
once  the  allegorical  tree  of  knowledge  became,  according  to 
the  church,  a  real  tree,  the  fruit  of  it  real  fruit,  and  the  eat- 
ing of  it  sinful.  As  priestcraft  was  always  the  enemy  of 
knowledge,  because  priestcraft  supports  itself  by  keeping 
people  in  delusion  ana  ignorance,  it  was  consistent  witn  its 
policy  to  make  the  acquisition  of  knowledge  a  real  sin. 

The  church  of  Rome  having  done  this,  it  then  brings  for- 
ward Jesus  the  son  of  Mary  as  suffering  death  to  redeem 
mankind  from  sin,  which  Adam,  it  says,  had  brought  into 


300  OF  THE   RELIGION   OF  DEISM,    ETO. 

the  world  by  eating  the  fruit  of  the  tree  of  knowledge.  But 
as  it  is  impossible  ior  reason  to  believe  such  a  story,  because 
it  can  see  no  reason  for  it,  nor  have  any  evidence  of  it,  the 
church  then  tells  us  we  must  not  regard  our  reason  but  must 
believe,  as  it  were,  and  that  through  thick  and  thin,  as  if 
God  had  given  man  reason  like  a  plaything,  or  a  rattle,  on. 
purpose  to  make  fun  of  him.  Reason  is  the  forbidden  tree 
of  priestcraft,  and  may  serve  to  explain  the  allegory  of  the 
forbidden  tree  of  knowledge,  for  we  may  reasonably  suppose 
the  allegory  had  some  meaning  and  application  at  the  time 
it  was  invented.  It  was  the  practice  of  the  eastern  nations 
to  convey  their  meaning  by  allegory,  and  relate  it  in  the 
manner  of  fact.  Jesus  followed  the  same  method,  yet  no- 
body ever  supposed  the  allegory  or  parable  of  the  rich  man 
and  Lazarus,  the  prodigal  son,  the  ten  virgins,  &c.  were 
facts.  Why  then  should  the  tree  of  knowledge,  which  is  far 
more  romantic  in  idea  than  the  parables  in  the  ISTew  Testa- 
ment are,  be  supposed  to  be  a  real  tree.*  The  answer  to  this 
is,  because  the  church  could  not  make  its  new  fangled  sys- 
tem, which  it  called  Christianity,  hold  together  without  it. 
To  have  made  Christ  to  die  on  account  of  an  allegorical  tree 
would  have  been  too  bare-faced  a  fable. 

But  the  account,  as  it  is  given  of  Jesus  in  the  New  Testa- 
ment, even  visionary  as  it  is,  does  not  support  the  creed  of 
the  church  that  he  died  for  the  redemption  of  the  world. 
According  to  that  account  he  was  crucified  and  buried  on  the 
Friday,  and  rose  again  in  good  health  on  the  Sunday  morn- 
ing, for  we  do  not  hear  that  he  was  sick.  This  cannot  be 
called  dying,  and  is  rather  making  fun  of  death  than  suffer- 
ing it.  There  are  thousands  of  men  and  women  also,  who 
if  they  could  know  they  should  come  back  again  in  good 
health  in  about  thirty-six  hours,  would  prefer  such  kind  of 
death  for  the  sake  01  the  experiment,  and  to  know  what  the 
other  side  of  the  grave  was.  Why  then  should  that  which 
would  be  only  a  voyage  of  curious  amusement  to  us  be  mag- 
nified into  merit  and  suffering  in  him  ?  If  a  God  he  could 
not  suffer  death,  for  immortality  cannot  die,  and  as  a  man 
his  death  could  be  no  more  than  the  death  of  any  other 
person. 

The  belief  of  the  redemption  of  Jesus  Christ  is  altogether 

*  The  remark  of  the  Emperor  Julian,  on  the  story  of  The  tree  of  Know- 
ledge, is  worth  observing.  "  If,"  said  he,  "  there  ever  had  been,  or  could  be,  a 
Tree  of  Knowledge,  instead  of  God  forbidding  man  to  eat  thereof,  it  would  ba 
;hat  of  which  he  would  order  him  to  eat  the  moat." 


OF   THE   EKLIGION    OF   DEISM,    ETC.  301 

an  invention  of  the  church  of  Eome,  not  the  dot  trine  of  the 
New  Testament.  What  the  writers  of  the  New  Testament 
attempted  to  prove  by  the  story  of  Jesus  is  the  resur- 
rection of  the  same  body  from  the  grave*  which  was  the  be- 
lief of  the  Pharisees,  in  opposition  to  the  Sadducees  (a  sect 
of  Jews)  who  denied  it.  Paul,  who  was  brought  up  a  Phari- 
see, labours  hard  at  this  point,  for  it  was  the  creed  of  his 
own  Pharisaical  church.  The  XY.  chap.  1st  of  Corinthians 
is  full  of  supposed  cases  and  assertions  about  the  resurrection 
of  the  same  body,  but  there  is  not  a  word  in  it  about  re- 
demption. This  chapter  makes  part  of  the  funeral  service 
of  the  Episcopal  church.  The  dogma  of  the  redemption  is 
the  fable  of  priestcraft  invented  since  the  time  the  New  Tes- 
tament was  compiled,  and  the  agreeable  delusion  of  it  suited 
with  the  depravity  of  immoral  livers.  When  men  are 
taught  to  ascribe  all  their  crimes  and  vices  to  the  tempta- 
tions of  the  Devil,  and  to  believe  that  Jesus,  by  his  death, 
rubs  all  off  and  pavs  their  passage  to  heaven  gratis,  they 
become  as  careless  in  morals  as  a  spendthrift  would  be  of 
money,  were  he  told  that  his  father  had  engaged  to  pay  off 
all  his  scores.  It  is  a  doctrine,  not  only  dangerous  to  morals 
in  this  world,  but  to  our  happiness  in  the  next  world,  be- 
cause it  holds  out  such  a  cheap,  easy,  and  lazy  way  of  get- 
ting to  heaven  as  has  a  tendency  to  induce  men  to  hug  the 
delusion  of  it  to  their  own  injury. 

But  there  are  times  when  men  have  serious  thoughts, 
and  it  is  at  such  times,  when  they  begin  to  think,  that 
they  begin  to  doubt  the  truth  of  the  Christian  Religion, 
and  wefi  they  may,  for  it  is  too  fanciful  and  too  full 
of  conjecture,  inconsistency,  improbability,  and  irration- 
ality, to  afford  consolation  to  the  thoughtful  man.  His 
reason  revolts  against  his  creed.  He  sees  that  none  of 
its  articles  are  proved,  or  can  be  proved.  He  may  believe 
that  such  a  person  as  is  called  Jesus  (for  Christ  was  not  his 
name)  was  born  and  grew  to  be  a  man,  because  it  is  no 
more  than  a  natural  and  probable  case.  But  who  is  to 
prove  he  is  the  son  of  God,  that  he  was  begotten  by  the 
Holy  Ghost?  Of  these  things  there  can  be  no  proof ;  and 
that  which  admits  not  of  proof,  and  is  against  the  laws 
of  probability,  and  the  order  of  nature  which  God  himself 
has  established,  is  not  an  object  for  belief.  Gox^has  not 
given  man  reason  to  embarrass  him,  but  to  prove  his  being 
imposed  upon. 

He  may  believe  that  Jesus  was  crucified,  because  many 


302  LETTER   TO    SAMT77SL   ADAMS. 

others  were  crucified,  but  who  is  to  prove  he  was  crucified  for 
the  sins  of  the  world  ?  This  article  has  no  evidence,  not  even  in 
the  New  Testament ;  and  if  it  had,  where  is  the  proof  that  the 
New  Testament,  in  relating  things  neither  probable  nor  prove- 
able,  is  to  be  believed  as  true ?  Wnen  an  article  in  a  creed  does 
not  admit  of  proof  nor  of  probability,  the  salvo  is  to  call  it 
revelation;  but  this  is  only^  putting  one  difficulty  in  the 
place  of  another,  for  it  is  as  impossible  to  prove  a  thing  to 
be  revelation  as  it  is  to  prove  that  Mary  was  gotten  with 
child  by  the  Holy  Ghost. 

Here  it  is  that  the  religion  of  Deism  is  superior  to  the  Chris- 
tian religion.  It  is  free  from  all  those  invented  and  tortur- 
ing articles  that  shock  our  reason  or  injure  our  humanity, 
and  with  which  the  Christian  religion  abounds.  Its  creed  is 
pure  and  sublimely  simple.  It  believes  in  God  and  there  it 
rests.  It  honours  reason  as  the  choicest  gift  of  God  to  man, 
and  the  faculty  by  which  he  is  enabled  to  contemplate  the 
power,  wisdom  and  goodness  of  the  Creator  displayed  in  the 
creation;  and  reposing  itself  on  his  protection,  both  here 
and  hereafter,  it  avoids  all  presumptuous  belief,  and  rejects, 
as  the  fabulous  inventions  of  men,  all  books  pretending  to 
revelation. 

T.  P. 


LETTER  TO  SAMUEL  ADAMS. 


MY  DEAE  AND  VENERABLE  FRIEND, 

I  RECEIVED  with  great  pleasure  your  friendly  and  affection- 
ate letter  of  Nov.  30th,  and  I  thank  you  also  for  the  frank- 
ness of  it.  Between  men  in  pursuit  of  truth,  and  whose 
object  is  the  happiness  of  man  both  here  and  hereafter, 
there  ought  to  be  no  reserve.  Even  error  has  a  claim  to 
indulgence,  if  not  to  respect,  when  it  is  believed  to  be  truth. 
I  am  obliged  to  you  for  your  affectionate  remembrance  of 
what  you  style  my  services  in  awakening  the  public  mind 
to  a  declaration  of  independence,  and  supporting  it  after  it 
was  declared.  I  also,  like  you,  have  often  looked  back  on 
those  times,  and  have  thought,  that  if  independence  had  not 
been  declared  at  the  time  it  was,  the  public  mind  could  not 
have  been  brought  up  to  it  afterwards.  It  will  immediately 


LETTER   TO   SAMUEL    ADAMS.  303 

occur  to  you,  who  were  so  intimately  acquainted  with  the 
situation  of  things  at  that  time,  that  I  allude  to  the  black 
times  of  seventy-six  /  for  though  I  know,  and  you  my  friend 
also  know,  they  were  no  other  than  the  natural  consequences 
of  the  military  blunders  of  that  campaign,  the  country 
might  have  viewed  them  as  proceeding  from  a  natural  ina- 
bility to  support  its  cause  against  the  enemy,  and  have  sunk 
under  the  despondency  of  that  misconceived  idea.  This  was 
the  impression  against  which  it  was  necessary  the  country 
should  be  strongly  animated. 

I  now  come  to  the  second  part  of  your  letter,  on  which  I 
shall  be  as  frank  with  you  as  you  are  with  me.  "  But  (say 
you)  when  I  heard  you  had  turned  your  mind  to  a  defence 
of  infidelity,  I  felt  myself  much  astonished,"  &c.  What, 
my  good  friend,  do  you  call  believing  in  God  infidelity  ?  for 
that  is  the  great  point  mentioned  in  the  Age  of  Reason 
against  all  divided  beliefs  and  allegorical  divinities.  The 
Bishop  of  Llandaff  (Dr.  Watson)  not  onlv  acknowledges 
this,  but  pays  me  some  compliments  upon  it,  in  his  answer 
to  the  second  part  of  that  work.  "  There  is  (says  he)  a  phi- 
losophical sublimity  in  some  of  your  ideas,  when  speaking 
of  the  Creator  of  the  Universe." 

What  then,  (my  much  esteemed  friend,  for  I  do  not  respect 
you  the  less  because  we  differ,  and  that  perhaps  not  much, 
in  religious  sentiments,)  what,  I  ask,  is  the  thing  called  infi- 
delity? If  we  go  back  to  your  ancestors  and  mine,  three 
or  four  hundred  years  ago,  for  we  must  have  fathers  and 
grandfathers  or  we  should  not  have  been  here,  we  shall  find 
them  praying  to  Saints  and  virgins,  and  believing  in  purga- 
tory and  transubstantiation ;  and  therefore,  all  of  us  are 
inndels  according  to  our  forefather's  belief.  If  we  go  back 
to  times  more  ancient  we  shall  again  be  infidels  according  to 
the  belief  of  some  other  forefathers. 

The  case,  my  friend,  is,  that  the  world  has  been  overrun 
with  fable  and  creed  of  human  invention,  with  sectaries  of 
whole  nations  against  other  nations,  and  sectaries  of  those 
sectaries  in  each  of  them  against  each  other.  Every  sectary, 
except  the  Quakers,  have  been  persecutors.  Those  who  fled 
from  persecution,  persecuted  in  their  turn,  and  it  is  this  con- 
fusion of  creeds  that  has  filled  the  world  with  persecution, 
and  deluged  it  with  blood.  Even  the  depredation  on  your 
commerce  by  the  Barbary  powers,  sprang  from  the  crusades 
of  the  church  against  those  powers.  It  was  a  war  of  creed 
u^aiust  creed,  each  boasting  of  God  for  its  author,  and 


304  LETTER   TO   SAMUEL   ADAMS. 

reviling  each  other  with  the  name  of  infidel.  If  I  do  not 
believe  as  you  believe,  it  proves  that  you  do  not  believe  as 
I  believe,  and  this  is  all  that  it  proves. 

There  is,  however,  one  point  of  union  wherein  all  religions 
meet,  and  that  is  in  the  first  article  of  every  man's  i,reed, 
and  of  every  nation's  creed,  that  has  any  creed  at  all,  1  be- 
lieve in  God.  Those  who  rest  here,  and  there  are  millions  who 
do,  cannot  bii  wrong  as  far  as  their  creed  goes.  Those  who 
choose  to  go  further  may  be  wrong,  for  it  is  impossible  that 
all  can  be  right,  since  there  is  so  much  contradiction  among 
them.  The  first,  therefore,  are,  in  my  opinion,  on  the  safest 
side. 

I  presume  you  are  so  far  acquainted  with  ecclesiastical 
history  as  to  know,  and  the  bishop  who  has  answered  me 
has  been  obliged  to  acknowledge  the  fact,  that  the  Books 
that  compose  the  New  Testament,  were  voted  by  yeas  and 
nays  to  be  the  Word  of  God,  as  you  now  vote  a  law,  by  the 
Popish  Council  of  Nice  and  Laodicea,  about  fourteen  hun 
dred  and  fifty  vears  ago.  With  respect  to  the  fact  there  is 
no  dispute,  neither  do  I  mention  it  for  the  sake  of  contro- 
versy. This  vote  may  appear  authority  enough  to  some, 
and  not  authority  enough  to  others.  It  is  proper,  however, 
that  every  body  should  know  the  fact. 

With  respect  to  the  Age  of  Reason,  which  you  so  much 
condemn,  and  that,  I  believe,  without  having  read  it,  for 
you  say  only  that  you  heard  of  it,  I  will  inform  you  of  a  cir- 
cumstance, because  you  cannot  know  it  by  other  means. 

I  have  said  in  the  first  page  of  the  first  part  of  that  work, 
that  it  had  long  been  my  intention  to  pifblish  my  thoughts 
upon  religion,  but  that  I  had  reserved  it  to  a  later  time  of 
life.  I  have  now  to  inform  you  why  I  wrote  it,  and  pub- 
lished it  at  the  time  I  did. 

In  the  first  place,  I  saw  my  life  in  continual  danger.  My 
friends  were  railing  as  fast  as  the  guillotine  could  cut  their 
heads  off,  and  as  I  expected  every  day  the  same  fate,  I 
resolved  to  begin  my  work.  I  appeared  to  myself  to  be  on 
my  death  bed,  for  death  was  on  every  side  of  me,  and  I  had 
no  time  to  lose.  This  accounts  for  my  writing  at  the  time 
I  did,  and  so  nicely  did  the  time  and  intention  meet,  that  I 
had  not  finished  the  first  part  of  the  work  more  than  six 
hours  before  I  was  arrested,  and  taken  to  prison.  Joel  Bar- 
low was  with  me,  and  knows  the  fact. 

In  the  second  place,  the  people  of  Fiance  were  running 
headlong  into  atheism,  and  I  nad  the  work  translated  and 


LETTER   TO    8AMUE1     A.DAM8.  505 

published  in  their  own  language,  to  stop  them  in  that  career, 
and  fix  them  to  the  first  article  (as  I  have  before  said)  01 
every  man's  creed,  who  has  any  creed  at  all,  /  believe  in 
God.  I  endangered  my  own  life,  in  the  first  place,  by  op- 

Eosing  in  the  Convention  the  executing  of  the  king,  and 
ibouring  to  show  they  were  trying  the  monarch  and  not  the 
man,  and  that  the  crimes  imputed  to  him  were  the  crimes 
of  the  monarchical  system ;  and  endangered  it  a  second  time 
by  opposing  atheism,  and  yet  some  of  your  priests,  for  I  do 
not  believe  that  all  are  perverse,  cry  out,  in  the  war-whoop 
of  monarchical  priestcraft,  what  an  infidel !  what  a  wicked 
man  is  Thomas  Paine !  They  might  as  well  add,  for  he  be- 
lieves in  God,  and  is  against  shedoing  blood. 

But  all  this  war-whoop  of  the  pulpit  has  some  concealed 
object.  Religion  is  not  the  cause,  but  is  the  stalking  horse. 
They  put  it  forward  to  conceal  themselves  behind  it.  It  is 
not  a  secret  that  there  has  been  a  party  composed  of  the 
leaders  of  the  Federalists,  for  I  do  not  include  all  Federalists 
with  their  leaders,  who  have  been  working  by  various  means 
for  several  years  past,  to  overturn  the  Federal  Constitution 
established  on  the  representative  system,  and  place  govern- 
ment in  the  new  world  on  the  corrupt  system  of  the  old. 
To  accomplish  this  a  large  standing  army  was  necessary, 
and  as  a  pretence  for  such  an  army,  the  danger  of  a  foreign 
invasion  must  be  bellowed  forth,  from  the  pulpit,  from  the 
press,  and  by  their  public  orators. 

I  am  not  of  a  disposition  inclined  to  suspicion.  It  is  in  its 
nature  a  mean  a.nd  cowardly  passion,  and  upon  the  whole, 
even  admitting  error  into  the  case,  it  is  better,  I  am  sure  it 
is  more  generous  to  be  wrong  on  the  side  of  confidence,  t.  i 
on  the  side  of  suspicion.  But  I  know  as  a  fact,  that  tiie 
English  Government  distributes  annually  fifteen  hundred 
pounds  sterling  among  the  Presbyterian  ministers  in  Eng- 
land, and  one  hundred  among  those  of  Ireland;*  and 
when  I  hear  of  the  strange  discourses  of  some  of  your  minis- 
ters and  professors  of  colleges  I  cannot,  as  the  Quakers  say, 
find  freedom  in  my  mind  to  acquit  them.  Their  anti-revo- 
lutionary doctrines  invite  suspicion,  even  against  one's  will, 
and  in  spite  of  one's  charity  to  believe  well  of  them. 

As  you  have  given  me  one  Scripture  phrase,  I  will  give 
you  another  for  those  ministers.  It  is  said  in  Exodus,  chapter 

*  There  must  undoubtedly  be  a  very  gross  mistake  in  respect  to  the  amount 
said  to  be  expended;  the  sums  intended  to  be  expressed  were  probably  fifteen 
hundred  thousand,  anc  one  hundred  thousand  pounds. — EDITOR. 


306  LETTER   TO    SAMUEL    A.DAM8. 

xxii.,  verse  28,  "  Thou  shalt  not  revile  the  gods,  nor  curse 
the  ruler  of  thy  people."  But  those  ministers,  such  I  mean 
as  Dr.  Emmons,  curse  ruler  and  people  both,  for  the  ma- 
jority are,  politically,  the  people,  and  it  is  those  who  have 
chosen  the  ruler  whom  they  curse. 

As  to  the  first  part  of  the  verse,  that  of  not  reviling  the 
gods,  it  makes  no  part  of  my  Scripture:  I  have  but  one 
God. 

Since  I  began  this  letter,  for  I  write  it  by  piecemeals  as  I 
have  leisure,  I  have  seen  the  four  letters  that  passed  between 
you  and  John  Adams.  In  your  first  letter  you  say,  "  Let 
divines  and  philosophers,  statesmen  and  patriots,  unite  their 
endeavours  to  renovate  the  age,  by  inculcating  in  the  minds 
of  youth  the  fear  and  love  of  the  Deity  and  umver sal  philan- 
thropy" Why,  my  dear  mend,  this  is  exactly  my  religion, 
and  is  the  whole  of  it.  That  you  may  have  an  idea  that  the 
Age  of  Reason  (for  I  believe  you  have  not  read  it)  inculcates 
this  reverential  fear  and  love  of  the  Deity,  I  will  give  you  a 
paragraph  from  it. 

"  Do  we  want  to  contemplate  his  power  ?  "We  see  it  in 
the  immensity  of  the  Creation.  Do  we  want  to  contemplate 
his  wisdom  ?  "We  see  it  in  the  unchangeable  order  by  which 
the  incomprehensible  whole  is  governed.  Do  we  want  to 
contemplate  his  munificence?  We  see  it  in  the  abundance 
with  which  he  fills  the  earth.  Do  we  want  to  contemplate 
his  mercy  ?  "We  see  it  in  his  not  withholding  that  abund- 
ance even  from  the  unthankful." 

As  I  am  fully  with  you  in  your  first  part,  that  respecting 
the  Deity,  so  am  I  in  your  second,  that  of*  universal  philan- 
thropy :  by  which  I  do  not  mean  merely  the  sentimental 
benevolence  of  wishing  well,  but  the  practical  benevolence 
of  doing  good.  We  cannot  serve  the  Deity  in  the  manner 
we  serve  those  who  cannot  do  without  that  service.  He 
needs  no  services  from  us.  "We  can  add  nothing  to  eternity. 
But  it  is  in  our  power  to  render  a  service  acceptable  to  him, 
and  that  is,  not  by  praying,  but  by  endeavouring  to  make 
his  creatures  happy.  A  man  does  not  serve  God  when  he 
prays,  for  it  is  himself  he  is  trying  to  serve ;  and  as  to  hiring 
or  paying  men  to  pray,  as  if  the  Deity  needed  instruction, 
it  is  in  my  opinion  an  abomination.  One  good  school-master 
is  of  more  use  and  of  more  value  than  a  load  of  such  parsons 
as  Dr.  Emmons,  and  some  others. 

You,  my  dear  and  much  respected  friend,  are  now  rar  in 
the  vale  of  years ;  I  have  yet,  I  believe,  some  years  in  store, 


LKTTEB   TO   SAMUEL    ADAMS.  307 

for  I  have  a  good  state  of  health  and  a  happy  mind :  I  take 
care  of  both,  by  nourishing  the  first  with  temperance,  and 
the  latter  with  abundance. 

This  I  believe  you  will  allow  to  be  the  true  philosophy  of 
life.  You  will  see  by  my  third  letter  to  the  citizens  of  the 
United  States,  that  I  have  been  exposed  to,  and  preserved 
through  many  dangers ;  but,  instead  of  buffeting  the  Deity 
with  prayers,  as  if  I  distrusted  him,  or  must  dictate  to  him, 
I  reposed  myself  on  his  protection ;  and  you,  my  friend, 
will  find,  even  in  your  last  moments,  more  consolation  in 
the  silence  of  resignation  than  in  the  murmuring  wish  of 
prayer. 

In  every  thing  which  you  say  in  your  second  letter  to 
John  Adams,  respecting  our  rights  as  men  and  citizens  in 
this  world,  I  am  perfectly  with  you.  On  other  points  we 
have  to  answer  to  our  Creator  and  not  to  each  other.  The 
key  of  heaven  is  not  in  the  keeping  of  any  sect,  nor  ought 
the  road  to  it  to  be  obstructed  by  any.  Our  relation  to 
each  other  in  this  world  is,  as  men,  and  the  man  who  is  a 
friend  to  man  and  to  his  rights,  let  his  religious  opinions  be 
what  they  may,  is  a  good  citizen,  to  whom  I  can  give,  as  I 
ought  to  do,  and  as  every  other  ought,  the  right  hand  of 
fellowship,  and  to  none  with  more  hearty  good  will,  my  dear 
mend,  than  to  you. 

THOMAS  PAHTX. 

City,  Jan.  1,  1801. 


EXTRACT  FROM  A 

LETTER  TO  ANDREW  A.  DEAN. 


RESPECTED  FBIEND, 

I  received  your  friendly  letter,  for  which  I  am  obliged  to 
you.  It  is  three  weeks  ago  to-day  (Sunday,  Aug.  15,)  that 
I  was  struck  with  a  fit  of  an  apoplexy,  that  deprived  me  of 
all  sense  and  motion.  I  had  neither  pulse  nor  breathing, 
and  the  people  about  me  supposed  me  dead.  I  had  felt 
exceedingly  well  that  day,  and  had  just  taken  a  slice  of 
bread  and  butter,  for  supper,  and  was  going  to  bed.  The 
fit  took  me  on  the  stairs,  as  suddenly  as  if  I  had  been  shot 
through  the  head  ;  and  I  got  so  very  much  hurt  by  the  fall, 
that  I  have  not  been  able  to  get  in  and  out  of  bed  since  that 
day,  otherwise  than  being  lifted  out  in  a  blanket,  by  two 
persons ;  yet  all  this  while  my  mental  faculties  have  remained 
as  perfect  as  I  ever  enjoyed  them.  I  consider  the  scene  I 
have  passed  through  as  an  experiment  on  dying,  and  I  find 
that  death  has  no  terrors  for  me.  As  to  the  people  called 
Christians,  they  have  no  evidence  that  their  religion  is  true.f 
There  is  no  more  proof  that  the  Bible  is  the  word  of  God, 
than  that  the  Koran  of  Mahomet  is  the  word  of  God.  It  is 
education  makes  all  the  difference.  Man,  before  he  begins 
to  think  for  himself,  is  as  much  the  child  of  habit  in  Greeds 
as  he  is  in  ploughing  and  sowing.  Yet  creeds,  like  opinions, 
prove  nothing. 

Where  is  the  evidence  that  the  person  called  Jesus  Christ 
is  the  begotten  Son  of  God  ?  The  case  admits  not  of  evi- 

*  Mr.  Dean  rented  Mr.  Paine's  farm  at  New  Rochelle. 

f  Mr.  Paine's  entering  upon  the  subject  of  religion  on  this  occasion,  it  may 
be  presumed,  was  occasioned  by  the  following  passage  in  Mr.  Dean's  letter  to 
him,  viz. : 

"  I  have  read  with  good  attention  your  manuscript  on  dreams,  and  examin- 
ation of  the  prophecies  in  the  Bible.  I  am  now  searching  the  old  prophecies, 
and  comparing  the  same  to  those  said  to  be  quoted  in  the  New  Testament.  I 
confess  the  comparison  is  a  matter  worthy  of  our  serious  attention  ;  I  know 
not  the  result  till  I  finish ;  then,  if  you  be  living,  I  shall  communicate  the 
same  to  you  ;  I  hope  to  be  with  you  soon." 
80S 


LETTER   TO   MB.    DEAH.  809 

dence  either  to  our  senses  or  our  mental  faculties :  neither 
has  God  given  to  man  any  talent  by  which  such  a  thing  is 
comprehensible.  It  cannot  therefore  be  an  object  for  faith 
to  act  upon,  for  faith  is  nothing  more  than  an  assent  the 
mind  gives  to  something  it  sees  cause  to  believe  is  fact. 
But  priests,  preachers,  and  fanatics,  put  imagination  in  the 
place  of  faith,  and  it  is  the  nature  of  the  imagination  to 
oelieve  without  evidence. 

If  Joseph  the  carpenter  dreamed,  (as  the  book  of  Matthew, 
chap.  1st,  says  he  did,)  that  his  betrothed  wife,  Mary,  was 
with  child,  by  the  Holy  Ghost,  and  that  an  angel  told  him 
so ;  I  am  not  obliged  to  put  faith  in  his  dream,  nor  do  I  put 
any,  for  I  put  no  faith  in  my  own  dreams,  and  I  should 
be  weak  and  foolish  indeed  to  put  faith  in  the  dreams  01 
others. 

The  Christian  religion  is  derogatory  to  the  Creator  in  aL 
its  articles.  It  puts  the  Creator  in  an  inferior  point  of  view, 
and  places  the  Christian  Devil  above  him.  It  is  he,  accord- 
ing to  the  absurd  story  in  Genesis,  that  outwits  the  Creator 
in  the  garden  of  Eden,  and  steals  from  him  his  favorite  crea- 
ture, man,  and,  at  last,  obliges  him  to  beget  a  son,  and  put 
that  son  to  death,  to  get  man  back  again,  and  this  the  priests 
of  the  Christian  religion,  call  redemption. 

Christian  authors  exclaim  against  the  practice  of  offering 
up  human  sacrifices,  which,  they  say,  is  done  in  some  coun- 
tries ;  and  those  authors  make  those  exclamations  without 
ever  reflecting  that  their  own  doctrine  of  sal  nation  is  founded 
on  a  human  sacrifice.  They  are  saved,  they  say,  by  the  blood 
of  Christ.  The  Christian  religion  begins  with  a  dream  and 
ends  with  a  murder. 

As  I  am  now  well  enough  to  sit  up  some  hours  in  the  day, 
though  not  well  enough  to  get  up  without  help,  I  employ 
myself  as  I  have  always  done,  in  endeavouring  to  bring  man 
to  the  right  use  of  the  reason  that  God  has  given  him,  and 
to  direct  his  mind  immediately  to  his  Creator,  and  not  to 
fanciful  secondary  beings  called  mediators,  as  if  God  was 
superannuated  or  ferocious. 

As  to  the  book  called  the  Bible,  it  it*  blasphemy  to  call  it 
the  word  of  God.  It  is  a  book  of  lies  and  contradiction, 
and  a  history  of  bad  times  and  bad  men.  There  is  but  a 
few  good  characters  in  the  whole  book.  The  fable  of  Christ 
and  his  twelve  apostles,  which  is  a  parody  on  the  sun  and 
the  twelve  signs  of  the  Zodiac,  copied  irom  the  ancient 
religions  of  the  eastern  world,  is  the  least  hurtful  part 


310  LETTEK   TO   ME.    DEAI*. 

Every  thing  told  of  Christ  has  reference  to  the  sun.  Hit 
reported  resurrection  is  at  sunrise,  and  that  on  the  first  day 
of  the  week ;  that  is,  on  the  day  anciently  dedicated  to  the 
sun,  and  from  thence  called  Sunday ;  in  xatin  Dies  SoUs,  the 
day  of  the  sun ;  as  the  next  day,  Monday,  is  Moon-day.  But 
there  is  no  room  in  a  letter  to  explain  these  things. 

While  man  keeps  to  the  belief  of  one  God,  his  reason 
unites  with  his  creed.  He  is  not  shocked  with  contradic- 
tions and  horrid  stories.  His  bible  is  the  heavens  and  the  earth. 
He  beholds  his  Creator  in  all  his  works,  and  every  thing  he 
beholds  inspires  him  with  reverence  and  gratitude.  From 
the  goodness  of  God  to  all,  he  learns  his  duty  to  his  fellow 
man,  and  stands  self-reproved  when  he  transgresses  it.  Such 
a  man  is  no  persecutor. 

But  when  he  multiplies  his  creed  with  imaginary  things, 
of  which  he  can  have  neither  evidence  nor  conception,  such 
as  the  tale  of  the  garden  of  Eden,  the  talking  serpent,  the 
fall  of  man,  the  dreams  of  Joseph  the  carpenter,  the  pretend- 
ed resurrection  and  ascension,  of  which  there  is  even  no 
historical  relation,  for  no  historian  of  those  times  mentions 
such  a  thing,  he  gets  into  the  pathless  region  of  confusion, 
and  turns  either  frantic  or  hypocrite.  He  forces  his  mind, 
and  pretends  to  believe  what  ne  does  not  believe.  This  is 
In  general  the  case  with  the  methodists.  Their  religion  is 
all  creed  and  no  morals. 

I  have  now  my  friend  given  you  a  fac  simile  of  my  mind 
on  the  subject  of  religion  and  creeds,  and  my  wish  is,  that 
you  make  this  letter  as  publicly  known  as  you  find  oppor- 
tunities of  doing.  Yours,  in  friendship, 

THOMAS  PAINE. 

JIT.  T.t  Aug.  1806. 


THE   END. 


The  Troth  Seeker  Library— Uniform  In  Size  and  Style, 

The  World's  Sage?,  Thinkers,  and  Reformers, 

Being  biographical  sketches  of  distinguished  Teachers,  Philosophers,  Innova- 
tors, Skeptics,  Infidel^  F  lunders  of  new  schools  of  Thought  and  Religion,  Dis- 
believers in  current  Theology,  and  the  most  active  Humanitarians  of  the  world. 

By  D.  M.  BENNETT,  Editor  of  "The  Truth  Seeker."  Cloth  $i ;  leather,  red 
edges  $4 ;  morocco,  gilt  edges  $4.50. 


THE  ANALYSIS  OF  RELIGIOUS  BELIEF, 

BY  VISCOUNT  AMBERLEY. 

An  elaborate  examination  into  the  origin  and  nature  of  the  various  religions 
of  the  world.  A  work  of  great  research,  embodying  a  large  amount  of  val- 
uable information  on  the  Origin  of  Religions.  Its  radical  character  excited  the 
enmity  of  the  leaders  of  the  English  Church,  and  great  efforts  were  made  by 
the  Duke  of  Bedford  and  others  to  suppress  it,  which  did  not  succeed.  It 
attracted  much  attention  in  England  as  well  as  America. 

Faithfully  produced,  complete,  from  the  London  (two  vol.  octavo)  edition, 
which  sells  at  from  $12  to  $15.  Price  of  this  edition  as  above. 


The  Great  Works  of  Thomas  Paine,  Complete. 

Containing  Life  of  Paine,  'Common  Sense,  The  Crisis.  The  Rights  of 
Man,  The  Age  of  Reason,  Examination  of  Prophecies,  Reply  to  the  Bishop  of 
Llandaff,  Letter  to  Mr.  Erskine,  An  Essay  on  Dreams,  Letter  to  Camille  Jor 
dan,  The  Religion  of  Deism,  Letter  to  Samuel  Adams,  etc.  Price  as  above. 


THE  CHAMPIONS  OF  THE  CHURCH. 

Being  biographical  sketches  of  eminent  Christians,  from  the  reputed  founder 
of  Christianity  to  the  present  time.  A  companion  book  to  "  The  "World's  Sages, 
Thinkers,  and  Reformers,"  containing  a  correct  history  of  the  distinguished  orna- 
ment" and  diabolical  characters  of  both  the  Romish  and  Protestant  Churches. 
Also  a  full  history  of  the  bloody  wars  of  Christianity  which  have  been 
inhumanly  waged  to  spread  its  rule.  It  contains  a  history  of  Jesuitism,  the 
abominations  of  the  Inquisition,  Catholic  and  Protestant  persecutions,  etc.,  etc., 
and  all  from  recognized  Christian  authorities.  1120  pages,  octavo.  Price  M 
abov«.  By  D.  M.  BENNETT,  Editor  of  "  The  Truth  Seeker." 


SUPERNATURAL    RELIGION. 

BY  PROF.  W.  K.  CLIFFORD,  F.R.S. 

This  remarkable  and  very  able  work  was  published  anonymously  in  London, 
in  three  volumes,  octavo,  and  doubtless  excited  more  attention  and  criticism  from 
theologians  than  any  similar  work  that  has  appeared  for  the  last  century.  It  IB 
unquestionably  the  ablest  examination  into  the  claims  of  Supernatural  and 
Revealed  Religion  of  any  work  that  has  as  yet  appeared.  It  exhausts  the  sub- 
jects of  Miracles,  The  Synoptic  Gospels,  The  Fourth  Gospel,  The  Acts  of  the 
Apostles.  The  Resurrection  and  the  Ascension,  and  contains  full  replies  to  the 
author's  critics.  Published  complete  in  one  volume,  from  the  last  London  edi 
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AND 

B.  F.  UNDERWOOD, 

Of  Boston,  Mass.        * 
Held  during  four  days   at  Aylmer,  Out.,  commencing  June  89,  1875 

REPORTED  BY  JOHN  T.  HAWKE. 

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i  Author  of  "  The  Martyrdom  of  Man."  etc. 

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Ho.  (REVISED  LIST.,  Ota. 

1  Discussion  on  Prayer.    D.  M.  Bennett  and  two  Clergymen fl 

J  Oration  on  the  Gods.    B.  G.  Ingersoll M 

8  Thomas  Paine.    B.  G.  Ingersoll .*...,. 

4  Arraignment  of  the  Church.    B.  G.  ingersoll 

I  Heretics  and  Heresies.    B.  G.  Ingersoll 

<  Humboldt.   B.  G.  Ingersoll 

7  The  Story  of  Creation.    D.  M.  Bennett 

8  TheOld  Snake  Story.    D.  M.  Bennett ^ 

9  The  Story  of  the  Flood.    D.  M.  Bennett 

10  The  Plagues  of  Egypt    D.  M.  Bennett 

11  Korah.  Datham.  and  Abirara.    D.  M.Bennett 

12  Balaam  and  his  Ass.    D.M.  Bennett 

18  Arraignment  of  Priestcraft.   D.M.  Bennett 

14  Old  Abe  and  Little  Ike.    John  Syphers 

16  Come  to  Dinner.    J.  Syphers 

16  Fog  Horn  Documents.    J.  Syphers 

17  The  Devil  Still  Ahead.    J.  Syphers 

18  Slipped  Up  Again.   J.  Syphers 

19  Joshua  Stopping  the  dun  and  Moon.    D.M.  Bennett 

90  Samson  and  his  Exploits.    D.  M.  Bennett 

21  The  Great  Wrestling  Match.    D.  M.  Bennett 

23  Discussion  with  Elder  Shelton.    D.  M.  Bennett 1 

38  Beply  to  Elder  sheltou's  Fourth  Letter.    D.  M.  Bennett 

24  Christians  at  Work.    Wm.  McDonnell , 

26  Discussion  with  Geo.  Snode.    D.M.  Bennett 

26  Underwood's  Prayer 

27  Honest  Questions  and  Honest  Answers.    D.M.Bennett 

28  Alessaudro  di  Cagliostro.    C.  Sotheran j 

29  Paine  Hall  Dedication  Address.    B.  F.  Underwood 

80  Woman's  Bights  and  Man's  Wrongs.   J.  Syphers 

81  Gods  and  God-houses    J.  Syphers 

82  The  Gods  of  Superstition  and  the  God  of  the  Universe.    Bennett .... 

83  What  has  Christianity  Done?    8.  H.  Preston 

84  Tribute  to  Thomas  Paine.   8.  H.  Preston 

86  Moving  the  Ark.    D.  M.  Bennett 

86  Bennett's  Prayer  to  the  Devil 

87  Short  Sermon.    Bev.  Theologious.  D.D 

88  Christianity  not  a  Moral  System.    X.  Y.  Z 

89  The  True  Saint.    S.P.Putnam 

40  Bible  of  Nature  vs.  The  Bible  of  Men.    J.  Syphers 

41  Our  Ecclesiastical  Gentry.    D.  M.  Bennett 

42  Elijah  the  Tishbite.    D.  M.  Bennett 

48  Christianity  a  Borrowed  System.    D.  M.  Bennett 

44  Design  Argument  Befuted.    Underwood 

45  Ellsha  the  Prophet.    D.M.Bennett 

46  Did  Jesus  Really  Exist?    D.  M.  Bennett 

47  Cruelty  and  Credulity  of  the  Human  Baee.   Dr.  Daniel  Arter. 

48  Freethought  in  the  West.    G.  L.  Henderson 

49  Sensible  Conclusions.    E.  E.  Guild. 

M  Jonah  and  the  Big  Fish.    D.M.  Bennett 

•1  Sixteen  Truth  Seeker  Leaflets.    No.  1 

•a  Marples-Underwood  Debate.    B.  F.  Underwood • 

M  Questions  for  Bible  Worshipers.   B.  F.  Underwood. 8 

M  An  Open  Letter  to  Jesus  Christ    D.  M.  Bennett M « 


M  The  Bible  God  Disproved  by  Nature.    W.  E.  Goldman t 

68  Bible  Contradictions 

t7  Jesus  not  a  Perfect  Character.     Underwood 

58  Prophecies.. " .... 

69  Bible  Prophecies  Concerning  Babylon.    Underwood 

60  Eeekiel's  Prophecies  Concerning  Tyre *" 

61  History  of  the  Devil.    Paden 

62  The  Jews  and  their  God.   Paden 1 

63  The  Devil's  Due-Bills.    Syphers 

64  The  Ills  we  Endure— Their  Cause  and  Cure.    Bennett 

65  Short  Sermon  No.  2.    Rev.  Theologians.  D.D 

66  God-Idea  in  History.    H.  B.  Brown 

67  Sixteen  Truth  Seeker  Leaflets.   No.  2 

68  Bath's  Idea  of  Heaven  and  Mine.    Susan  H.  Wixon 

69  Missionaries.     Mrs.  E.  D.  Slenker 

TO  Vicarious  Atonement.    J.  8.  Lyon .• 

71  Paine's  Anniversary.    C.A.Codman 3 

72  Shadrach,  Meshaoh,  and  Abednego.    Bennett. t 

73  Foundations.    Syphers 3 

74  Daniel  in  the  Lion's  Den.    Bennett. 3 

75  An  Hour  with  the  Devil " 10 

76  Reply  to  Erastus  F.  Brown...." 8 

77  The  Fearof  Death ." 6 

78  Christmas  and  Christianity..." 6 

79  The  Relationship  of  Jesus.  Jehovah,  and  the  Virgin  Mary.    W.  E. 

Coleman 3 

80  Address  on  Paine's  189th  Birthday.    Bennett I 

81  Hereafter ;  or.  the  Half -Way  House.    Syphers  3 

82  Christian  Courtesy.   Bennett 1 

83  Revivalism  Examined.    Dr.  A.  G.  Humphrey 5 

84  Moody's  Sermon  on  Hell.    R«v.  J.  P.  Hopps,  London 3 

85  Matter,  Motion.  Life,  and  Mind.    Bennett 10 

86  An  Enquiry  About  God's  Sons " 3 

87  Freethough't  Judged  by  its  Fruits.    Underwood 1 

88  David,  God's  Peculiar  Favorite.    Mrs.  Slenker 3 

89  Logic  of  Prayer.    C.  Stephenson 3 

90  Biblo-Manla.    Otter  Cordates 3 

91  Our  Ideas  of  God.    Underwood 1 

92  The  Bible;  is  it  Divinely  Inspired?   D.  Arter 3 

93  Obtaining  Pardon  for  Sins.    Hudson  Tuttle 1 

94  The  New  Raven.    Will  Cooper ft 

95  Jesus  Christ.    Bennett 10 

96  Ichabod  Crane  Papers 19 

97  Special  Providences.    W.  S.  Bell 3 

98  Snakes.    Mrs.  E.  D.  Slenker 3 

99  Do  the  Works  of  Nature  Prove  a  Creator?    Sciota 2 

100  The  Old  and  the  New.    Ingersoll 6 

101  140th  Anniversary  of  Thomas  Paine's  Birthday.    Bennett  etals » 

102  The  Old  Religion  and  the  New.    W.  8.  Bell I 

103  Does  the  Bible  Teach  us  all  we  know?     Bennett 3 

104  Evolution  of  Israel's  God.     A.  L.  Rawson 10 

105  Decadenceof  Christianity.    Capphro : ...  3 

106  Franklin,  Washington,  and  Jefferson,  Unbelievers 3 

107  The  Safe  Side.     H.  B.  Brown 6 

108  The  Holy  Bible  a  Historical  Humbug.    S.H.Preston 3 

109  Ghosts.    Ingersoll S 

110  Invocation  to  the  Universe.   Bennett 1 

111  Reply  to  Scientific  American.    Bennett 1 

lU  Sensible  Sermon,    BOY.  M.  J.  Sarase.... • 


Ill  Cora*  to  Jeans.    Bennett 

114  Where  was  Jesus  Born?    8.  H.  Preston IUII. 

115  The  Wonders  of  Prayer.   Bennett 

116  Tho  Sunday  Question.    Bennett "." 

J17  Constantine  the  Great.    Preston 

118  The  Irrepressible  Conflict  between  Christianity  and  Civilisation. 

W.  8.  Bell 

119  The  New  Faith.    J.  L.  Stoddard !..!*.!!."!! 

120  Liberty  for  Man,  Woman,  and  Child.    Ingersoll 

121  Ingersoll's  Review  of  his  Reviewers 

122  The  Great  Religions  of  the  World.    Bennett ]..       10 

133  Paine  Vindicated.    Ingersoll 10 

124  Sinful  Saints,  etc.    Bennett ie 

123  German  Liberalism.    Mrs.  Clara  Neyman 2 

126  Crimes  and  Cruelties  of  Christianity.     Underwood 10 

127  Tyndallon  Man's  Soul 

128  Paine  Glorified.  Ingersoll 

129  Who  was  Jesus  Christ?    W.  E.  Goleman 

180  The  E  hies  of  Religion.    W.  K.  Clifford 

181  Paine  was  Junius.    W.  H.  Burr 

182  My  Religious  Belief.    Ella  Gibson 

183  The  Authority  of  the  Bible.    Underwood 

134  Talks  with  the  Evangelists.     Elmer  Woodruff,  M.  D 

186  Is  there  a  Future  Life?    Bennett 

136  Torquemada  and  the  Inquisition.    Bennett 

187  Christian  Love    0.  L.  James 

188  Science  and  the  Bible.    John  Jasper 

189  Massacre  of  St.  Bartholomew.    S.H.Preston a 

140  Astro-Theology.     L.  L.  Daweon 9 

141  Infidelity.    H.  W.  Beecher 1 

149  Sepher  Toldoth  Jeschu.     Scholasticus 10 

SCIENTIFIC  SERIES. 

1  Hereditary  Transmission.    Prof.  Louis  Elsberg.  M.  D S 

2  Evolution ;  from  the  Homogeneous  to  the  Heterogeneous.   Under- 

wood  

8  Darwinism.    Underwood 

4  Literature  of  the  Insane.     F.  B.  Marvin 

6  Responsibility  of  Sex.    Mrs.  Sara  B.  Chase.  M.  D 

6  Graduated  Atmospheres.    J.  McCarroll 

7  Death.    Frederic  B.  Marvin.  M.  D 

8  How  do  Marsupial  Animals  Propagate  their  kind?   A.  B.  Bradford.. 

9  The  Unseen  World.   Prof.  J.  Fiske 10 

10  The  Evolution  Theory— Huxley's  Three  Lectures 10 

11  Is  America  the  New  World?   L.  L.  Dawson It 

12  Evolution  Teaches  neither  Atheism  nor  Materialism.  B.  8.  Brigham. 

13  Nibble  at  J.  Flske's  Crumb  for  the  Modern  Symposium.     W • 

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of  the  Church.  By  Mrs.  ELMINA  D.  SLENKER,  author  of  "  Studying 
the  Bible,"  etc.  Thousands  of  copies  of  this  little  work  should  be 
placed  in  the  hands  of  honest  enquirers  after  truth.  Price  only  15  cts., 
$1.50  per  dozen,  or  $10.00  per  hundred.  D.  M.  BENNETT, 
141  Eighth  Street,  New  York. 

Six  Lectures  on  Astronomy. 

Delivered  in  Steinway  Hall,  New  York,  by  PBOP.  RICHARD  A.  PROO* 
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Eight  Scientific  Tracts. 

128  pages.     Price,  20  cents. 

Theory  of  Evolution. 

Three  lectures  by  PROF.  THOMAS  HENRY  HUXLEY.  Delivered  ia 
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The  Unseen  World. 
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Is  America  the  New  "World? 
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UNDERWOOD -MARPLES   DEBATE. 

BETWEEN 
B.  F.  UNDERWOOD,  of  Boston,  Mass.,  Liberal  Lecturer, 

AND 
RBV.  JOHN  MARPLES,  of  Toronto,  Ont.,  of  the  Presbyterian  Church. 

field  during  four  evenings  in  July,  1871,  at  Napanee,  Ont 
Two  propositions  Discussed.  Pint — "That  Atheism,  Materialism, 
and  Modern  Skepticism  are  illogical  and  contrary  to  reason."  MAKPLKH 
affirming;  UNDERWOOD  denying.  Second — "The  Bible,  consisting  of 
the  Old  and  New  Testaments,  evidences  beyond  all  other  books,  its 
divine  origin."  MARPLES  affirming;  UNDERWOOD  denying. 

Reported  in  full  by  JOHN  T.  HAWKS,  of  th«  Toronto  Doily  Ltadtr 
Paper,  40  cents  ;  leather,  75  cents.  D.  M.  BENNETT, 

141  Eighth  Bt ,  New  York. 


THE  "HOLY  CROSS"  SERIES. 

No.  1.  The  Priest  in  Absolution.  This  work  is  an  abstract 
from  the  larger  volume  published  in  England  in  1876,  and 
which  in  consequence  of  the  great  plainness,  and  in  fact 
indecency  of  language,  was  suppressed  by  the  legal  authorities. 
The  abstract  is  also  a  criticism  and  denunciation  of  the  prac- 
tice of  the  Confessional,  and  is  designed  with  the  "Holy  Cross" 
series  in  its  entirety  to  show  up  the  censurable  and  abomina- 
ble conduct  of  the  Romish  Church  in  its  true  light  Twenty- 
five  cents. 

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in  Europe  and  America,  and  taken  from  authentic  sources. 
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of  the  blackest  criminals  the  earth  has  ever  borne.  Fifty 
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blood  of  thirty  million  human  beings  was  made  to  redden  the 
earth.  Fifty  cents. 

No  6.  The  Atrocities  of  the  Inquisition.  Illustrated. 
The  blackest  disgrace  of  humanity,  by  which  according  to 
Vrbtor  Hugo,  the  great  French  writer,  more  than  five  millions 
of  human  beings  were  put  to  death  in  the  most  excruciating 
torture,  in  dungeons,  on  the  ra«k,  in  the  death-chamber,  and 
at  the  stake  in  fire.  Fifty  cents. 

No.  7.  Horrible  Persecutions  by  the  Church,  includ- 
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THE  TRUTH   SEEKER, 

A  Weekly  Journal  of  Progress  and  Reform ; 


DEVOTED   TO 


SCIENCE,    MORALS,    FREETHOUGHT 
HUMAN    HAPPINESS. 


D.  M.  BENNETT,  EDITOR  AND  PUBLISHER. 

Believing  there  is  nothing  in  the  world  so  valuable  as  TRUTH,  "  THE 
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demnation of  the  errors  and  fallacies  of  the  past,  and  in  holding  up  in 
the  light  of  the  present  era  the  theological  dogmas  and  the  blinding 
creeds  of  pagan  superstition  which  had  their  origin  thousands  of  years 
ago,  in  the  primitive  ages  of  our  race. 

"  THE  TRUTH  SEEKER  "  was  started  as  an  eight-page  Monthly,  in 
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Every  lover  of  Truth ;  every  person  favorable  to  the  fearless  expres- 
sion of  honest  opinion ;  every  individual  who  wishes  to  spread  broad- 
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D.  M.  BENNETT,  EDITOR  AJJO  PROPRIETOR, 
Science  Hall,  141  Eighth  St,  New  York. 


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